On hearing this the old gentleman begged of me to stop the party, and away he went, full of bustle and importance, to satisfy himself.  In a few minutes he returned and said we might go on.  We had halted close to the brow of a gentle descent into a small creek junction at this particular spot, and on advancing a few paces came in view of the natives, assembled on the bank of the river below.  Men only were present, but they appeared to have been taken by surprise, and were in great alarm.  They had their spears for hunting, and a few hostile weapons, but not many; and certainly had not met together with any hostile intention.

Some of the men were very good looking and well made, but I think the natives of the Darling generally are so.  They looked with astonishment on the drays, which passed close to them; and I observed that several of them trembled greatly.  At this time Nadbuck had walked to some little distance with two old men, holding each by the hand in the most affectionate manner, and he was apparently in deep and earnest conversation with them.  Toonda, on the other hand, had remained seated on one of the drays, until it descended into the creek.  He then got off, and walking up to the natives, folded his blanket round him with a haughty air, and eyed the whole of them with a look of stern and unbending pride, if not of ferocity.  Whether it was that his firmness produced any effect I cannot say, but after one of the natives had whispered to another, he walked up to Toonda and saluted him, by putting his hands on his shoulders and bending his head until it touched his breast.  This Toonda coldly returned, and then stood as frigid as before, until the drays moved on, when he again resumed his seat and left them without uttering a word.  Nadbuck had separated from his friends, after having as it seemed imparted to them some important information, and coming up to myself and Mr. Browne, whispered to us, “Bloody rogue that fellow, you look after jimbuck.”  The contrast between these two men was remarkable:  the crafty duplicity of the one, and the haughty bearing of the other.  But I am led to believe that there was some latent cause for Toonda’s conduct, since he asked me to shoot the natives, and was so excited that he pushed his blanket into his mouth, and bit it violently in his anger.  On this I offered him a pistol to shoot them himself, but he returned it to me with a smile.  Of course it will be understood that I should not have allowed him to fire it.

Two of the old men followed when we left the other natives, to whom I made presents in the afternoon; but it is remarkable that many of them trembled whilst we staid with them, and although their women were not present, they hovered on the opposite bank of the Darling all the time.  We kept wide of the river almost all day, travelling between the scrub and lagoons, but we had occasionally to ascend and cross ridges of loose sand, over which the bullock-drivers were obliged to help each other with their teams.  There was not the slightest change in the character of the distant interior, but the vicinity of the Darling was thickly timbered for more than three-quarters of a mile from its banks, but the wood was valueless for building purposes.