This I cut off and threw away, much to the horror of the elders of his tribe, who, if they could catch, would inflict condign punishment upon him.  When he and old Jimmy met at Port Augusta, and Jimmy saw him without his chignon and other emblems of novice-hood, that old gentleman talked to him like a father; but Tommy, knowing he had me to throw the blame on, quietly told the old man in plain English to go to blazes.  The expression on old Jimmy’s face at thus being flouted by a black boy, was indescribable; he thought it his duty to persecute Tommy still farther, but now Tommy only laughed at him and said I made him do it, so old Jimmy gave him up at last as a bad job.  Poor old fellow, he was always talking about his wife and children; I was to have Mary, and Peter Nicholls Jinny.  Alec, Jimmy, and I reached the bay on the 14th, but at Colona, on the 12th, we heard there had been a sad epidemic amongst the natives since I left, and poor old Jimmy had lost two of his children, both Mary and Jinny.  When he heard this, the poor old fellow cried, and looked at me, as much as to say if I had not taken him away he might have saved them.  It was but poor consolation to tell him, what he could not understand, that those whom the gods love die young.  I suffered another loss, as a bright little black boy called Fry, a great favourite of mine, with splendid eyes and teeth, whom I had intended to bring with me as a companion for Tommy, was also dead.  I parted from old Jimmy the best of friends, but he was like Rachael weeping for her children, and would not be comforted.  I gave him money and presents, and dresses for his wife, and anything he asked for, but this was not very much.

Our stay at Fowler’s Bay was not extended longer than I could help.  Mr. Armstrong, the manager, made me a present of a case of brandy, and as I wanted to take some stores to Youldeh, he allowed me to take back the camels I had brought him, and sent a man of his—­Richard Dorey—­to accompany me to Youldeh, and there take delivery of them.

On the 17th we left the bay, and the spindrift and the spray of the Southern Ocean, with the glorious main expanding to the skies.  We stayed at Colona with Mr. Murray a couple of days, and finally left it on the 21st, arriving with Dorey and his black boy at Youldeh on the 25th.

Tommy Oldham’s father had also died of the epidemic at the bay.  Richard Dorey’s black boy broke the news to him very gently, when Tommy came up to me and said, “Oh, Mr. Giles, my”—­adjective [not] blooming—­“old father is dead too.”  I said, “Is that how you talk of your poor old father, Tommy, now that he is dead?” To this he replied, much in the same way as some civilised sons may often have done, “Well, I couldn’t help it!”