CHAPTER V.The island—The gigantic cockle-shell—Amongst the blacks—TheCorroboree.
Aftergetting out of the water, Mat and Tim remained stretched on the sand without moving a limb, enjoying the sense of perfect security from the sea; but at length they felt that they must commence to look for water, their thirst was so great after all the salt water that they had swallowed. On trying to rise, they found they could scarcely stand, so numbed and weary were their limbs; but by stamping and running, they caused the blood to flow through their veins, and were thus enabled to start on a small voyage of discovery.
The island, as it proved to be, consisted of large rocks full of caves with a few bushes and ferns growing here and there. There was no lack of water in the crevices of the rocks, and astringent though it was, it seemed like nectar to the thirsty lads. In one of the caves they found that the sand was deep, dry, and even warm, and in this spot they determined to take a good long rest, which they felt themselves sadly in need of. Tim had proceeded to explore oneof these caves, when Mat heard him call, “Look here,” and proceeding to the spot, found his brother examining the floor of the cave, which was covered with oyster shells; a further search showed the remains of several small fires with more shells round them.
“Some one has had a good feast here, Mat; let us have a nap, and thenwe’lllook for oysters.”
So without more ado, they buried themselves in the sand up to their necks, and fell into a sound sleep.
How long they slept neither of them knew, but Mat was awakened by a cold feeling about his nose, and jumping up, found to his astonishment and delight, his faithful dog, which greeted him with short, sharp barks of delight; the noise woke Tim, who perceiving his favourite, seized him, and the two rolled over together with joy. They found to their surprise that Jumper’s coat was quite dry, and on emerging from the cave, perceived that whilst they had been sleeping, the storm had abated, and the sun was now shining, also that the tide had run out, leaving their island connected with the mainland by a spit of sand. The tracks of the dog plainly showed that, having landed farther down the coast, he had been trying along the edge of the water for his masters, until led to them by this streak of sand.
Congratulating themselves upon the recovery of their dog, which they had given up for lost, Mat and Tim proceeded to gather a supply of oysters—thesebeing rock oysters were easily detached by the tap of a stone.
In the pools, left by the receding tide, amongst the rocks and coral, many kinds of fish were imprisoned, and there were quantities of crabs in a muddy belt of mangroves, so that there was no lack of food, which, however, had to be eaten raw.
“We’ve always eaten oysters raw,” quoth Mat, “and why not fish that swim?”
But Tim was too much engaged to answer, he had seen some large mullet endeavouring to escape out of a channel in the rocks, and was wading about amongst the green weed, piling stones across the outlet of this creek, previous to pursuing the fish, when suddenly under water, in a cleft of the rocks, he felt his foot seized, and held in a vice-like grasp. The shock nearly threw him down, but recovering himself, he shouted,—
“Mat!here, quick!”
The latter rushed up at once, crying,—
“Got a rock on your foot?”
“No,” gasped Tim, “it’s more like a dozen rat-traps, and it’s pinching fearful.”
Mat by this time had cleared away the weed, and at length, through the dark water could be seen the outlines of a gigantic double shell, with his brother’s leg imprisoned in its jaws.
“Look, how awful!” cried Tim; “I can never get loose from that big brute of a cockle.”
Mat tugged and tore at the shell, and, being a powerful lad, he expected to be able to rip one side off by the hinge, but he could no more move it than he could the rocks to which it was attached.
“It’s no good, old man, it’s too far for me to reach it yet, but, thank God, the water’s falling; if ’twere rising we’d be done. Do you feel you can last out an hour or so?”
“I don’t know, Mat, I feel awful queer and sick, but I can find the pain is out of my foot, for I can’t feel the limb at all.”
The first thing that Mat did was to pile up rocks under his brother, by this means getting him into a more restful position, he then wedged stones into the jaws of the fish, hoping thus to take some of the frightful pressure off the foot, and, bidding Tim be of good cheer, started for the shore, returning presently with a heavy, waterlogged piece of wreckage, and—
“See here, Tim!” he cried, as he approached him, and triumphantly held up an iron spike, “I knocked this out of the old timber, this’ll do the job.”
The water had now fallen so much that the jaws of the huge shell were well exposed.
First scraping the mud and stones, so as to get down to the base of the fish, Mat placed the heavy spike against the shell, which Tim had graphically enough described as a huge cockle; such, indeed, it exactly resembled, but on a gigantic scale, measuring along the jaws over three feet; he then dealt his pieceof iron a heavy blow with the piece of timber, but the iron would not penetrate—flew off at a tangent: recovering it, he proceeded to examine the shell more closely, and for this purpose baled out most of the remaining water with his hands, then inserted the end of the spike at another angle; the next time he essayed he drove the bolt right through the shell up to the hilt; this, however, had no effect upon the clasping powers of the monster, the foot was jammed as tight as ever.
“Oh! for my axe!” said Mat, “but never fear. Now to get the spike out. I’ll kill this devilsomehow.”
It seemed a long time before the spike could be released, but at length, succeeding in this, Mat drove it in every direction through the living, leathery substance of the creature itself.
It wouldnotrelax.
He then rammed the piece of timber in, and, exerting his full strength, attempted to prise open the shell, he felt that the enemy was slowly opening, when snap went his rotten lever, broken short off.
“It’s too ‘brow’” (brittle), gasped Tim.
Nothing discouraged, Mat set to work with the remaining bit of his stick, but after another hard struggle, and sweating at every pore, he had to sit down a moment to recover; literally a moment, for he had hardly settled himself in a position to catch the breeze, turning towards the open sea for thispurpose, when his ear caught the dull moaning of the tide, which had turned!!
Without a word, but with an agonized feeling in his heart, Mat jumped up, and driving his lever far down into the mutilated fish, and planting his feet against the opposite rock, gave one long and frantic “prise;” when, oh, joy! through the blinding streams of perspiration that ran over his face, he first saw the stones falling in, and he plainlyfeltthe double shell slowly give.
“Pull, Tim!” he yelled; and his brother was free, being, however, forced to lift his crippled foot with both hands out of the jaws of the fish, whilst Mat never relaxed his hold of the lever.
The instant that the foot was released, and the timber thrown aside, the stones fell completely in, and the shell closed with a sudden snap. Mat, however, did not wait to see more, for merely administering a furious blow on to the beast, which only had the effect of splintering the lips, he seized the almost unconscious Tim, hoisted him on his shoulders, and hurried as fast as he could over cruelly sharp rocks to the shore, somewhere about a quarter of a mile distant. With a couple of rests he got over the distance, and at length sank down with his burden under some shady trees, through which a little stream of water flowed on its way to the sea.
“I believe that pure water has saved my life,” said Tim, after he had drunk his fill, and had his leg,which was terribly swollen and cut, swathed in some soft bark, which was hanging down in ragged tatters on a large tree close by, and which Mat wetted in the sweet water before applying.
Our foresters, it must be borne in mind, were in a woeful plight. True, they had escaped the one great danger which they shared during that terrible swim; but what had been their experience, so far, on the shore? In the first place, they were aware that savages were about, for they had seen their lately-used camping-places, at all events their fishing resorts, and remains of their recent fires. Then the action of the salt water and wind on their skins; still worse, the powerful rays of a tropical sun, subsequently, had caused a sort of boiling-peeling process to set in. Added to this, Tim, as we have seen, had had his ankle-bone nearly crushed through, and Mat, now that he had a moment of leisure, found that his old wound—that one inflicted by the bloodhound—had broken open, a fact which he was aware of during the last two hours from the pain he felt. It is doubtful, had they not found shade andgoodwater, whether our lads would not have left their bones on the strand.
After Mat had made up a soft bed of grass and bark for his brother, and covered him over with the same material, he stepped outside the timber to have a look round.
Having finished his survey, he was returning todoctor his own leg when he descried a thin column of smoke, which seemed suddenly to shoot up in the distance. Hastening to Tim, he told him what he had just seen, and that he believed the fire must have been just lit, for that there was no appearance of smoke when he first quitted him to look round.
“Now, Tim,” he continued, “men have lit that fire, and, be they friends or foes, we’d better seek them out when we can travel; for I know we can’t last long without fire or clothes, and both of us wounded; but I’ll strap up my leg tight with this soft bark stuff, and then after a bit I’ll be able to carry you. I can easily do it, with rests; anyhow, we’ll get away from this salt water, there’s too much danger in it.”
Tim answered wearily enough,—
“Let’s rest here a day or so, and then, I think, with your help, in a cool night or early morning, I can get along.”
So Mat brought up a heap of shell-fish to the camp, and by evening had made their sleeping-quarters a little more comfortable by means of boughs and bark.
The night passed without further incident; but it was a period of feverish nightmare to both brothers; lie how they would, their skins were so blistered that the pain was almost unendurable, and Mat, besides, was up many times to cool his brother’s wounded leg with water.
At daylight they were awakened from a doze by the barking of Jumper. Mat was on his legs in a moment, and, proceeding cautiously to the spot, discovered the dog trying to claw up a tree, evidently striving to get at something in the branches. This proved to be a huge lizard, which was lying out on a limb a few feet from the ground.
Being an adept at “squirrelling” at his old home in the Forest, Mat knocked the animal off his perch with sticks; and Jumper, who had been intently watching the proceedings, had it in his jaws almost before it reached the ground.
Near this spot Mat observed lying on the ground some tempting-looking fruits, in colour and shape somewhat resembling an orange, which had evidently fallen off a kind of stunted palm-tree. These he gathered up, and, together with the lizard, carried them back to their camp. With a sharp shell he cut out the fat from the lizard, and put it by to dress their wounds with; but the raw flesh of the beast proved quite uneatable by reason of its utter want of taste; whilst the delicious-looking fruit was far worse from the opposite reason—it was so intensely bitter and acrid that they quickly spat it out again. However, Jumper made a hearty meal off the lizard, the poor dog not having had anything but raw fish up to this time.
The view from their camp was a calm and peaceful one. The Pacific Ocean, which had so latelybelied its name, now stretched, as far as the eye could reach, in one unruffled surface; beautiful bays indented the coast both north and south, whilst huge grey-looking forests seemed to mingle with the now blue waters, growing apparently to their very edge. Not a sail of any description had the brothers seen upon the ocean; the only sign of man was the smoke, or rather smokes, for by the second day the fires had evidently increased in numbers.
Our foresters found that the fat of the lizard well rubbed in did them more good than cold water bandages, and one afternoon Tim said he thought he could travel. They both agreed that it would be a relief even to move camp, though they might take a long time before they reached the strange fires. Mat procured a couple of stout sticks to lean upon, remarking, as he gave one to his brother with a smile, “We’ve no call to trouble about the luggage;” which, indeed, so far, was lucky.
As long as they travelled quite slowly, with long rests, they found they could “keep going” very well. Mat—by far the most able man, though they were both cripples—carried Tim over bad bits of ground; but on level country the latter managed well enough by resting one hand on his brother’s shoulder. Having thus covered some miles of country, they came to a water-hole with several small tracks leading to it; round the margin were prints of numerous feet freshly stamped in the sand.
“Here they be,” whispered Mat, pointing to the signs, “big feet and little feet, a whole tribe of ’em, and can’t be far off neither. We must go careful like.”
Resuming their journey, they crossed a plain of treeless waste, and then entered a country thickly overgrown with scrub.
Jumper, who was ahead, and had entered the thicket, returned growling, with bristles erect, and at the same moment some dark forms could be seen rushing into a lagoon, which now appeared in a sort of clearing. Then all was still.
Mat, whose eyesight was specially sharp, whispered,—
“I can see what looks like a black nose shaking the water by that great water-leaf.”
The brothers stood quietly, hesitating what to do next.
Suddenly Jumper commenced growling again, with his gaze fixed on one side of the lagoon. At the same instant more than one black fellow could be seen stealthily approaching through the long grass, their bodies glistening with beads of water.
“Some have got behind us,” again whispered Mat.
And indeed the white men appeared to be surrounded.
“You hold the dog tight, Tim, and I’ll try and make friends.”
Perceiving that Jumper was held, an old black fellow,armed with club, spear, and shield, walked boldly up to Mat, jabbering loudly the whole time, with chin in the air, and after feeling him all over, was about to do the same to Tim; but this Jumper would not stand, and Tim, by signs, implored the native to keep back.
The old man understood, and called to the other blacks, who immediately flocked up, and, hearing the white men talk, were evidently relieved to find that they were human beings like themselves, and thereupon made signs to know from whence they came. Mat, for answer, pointed to the sea, imitating the action of swimming. One of the blacks, who seemed to be the chief, comprehended at once; and the brothers saw by his gestures that he was explaining to the others what was meant, at which there was much jabbering and guttural ejaculations.
Mat pointed out how blistered and wounded their bodies and legs were, and explained by pantomime that they were hungry.
The natives now seemed satisfied, and led them by the hand, or rather conducted Mat in this manner—for they were afraid to approach Tim again, on account of the furious growls of Jumper—to the camp fires, where they intimated to the white men they should lie down; they then gave them a couple of cloaks of ’possum skin to cover their bodies with, and a quantity of roasted roots and fish to eat; thisfare seemed to put new life in the brothers as they reclined on their soft rugs.
A black fellow then cooe’ed loudly, and several women and children seemed to spring up from the long grass around, where they had doubtless been hiding until the men knew with whom they had to deal.
Mat so far knew, as the whole tribe had now surrounded them, that he and his brother had fallen amongst blacks of the mainland of Australia, for he not only recognized types of visage, pictures of which he had seen in the squire’s museum in the Forest, but also most of the camp equipment, of which the squire had many specimens. Thus he was able to point out and name to Tim spears, woomeras, yelamans, boomerangs, stone tomahawks, and nullah-nullahs; also their dilly bags, large and small, containing fish and roots, and many small articles wrapt up in ’possum skins.
Whilst they were regaling themselves the tribe kept up an incessant jabbering, as they pointed out the white men to each other.
One of the blacks showed by signs that there were other white men, but men clothed; he seemed to imply far, far away to the west. This gave the brothers hope that there might be a settlement in that direction, until by repeated signs they surmised that they must be white men travelling to the north.
It was almost night when our gipsies encounteredthe natives, and by the time that they had finished their meal, the camp was wrapped in darkness, save for the light given out by the tiny fires.
Seeing that the white men had eaten up all their food, the blacks gave them a gourd of water, and then, taking Mat by the hand again, and signing to Tim to follow, conducted them to a gunyah, or hut, which was made of saplings and covered with bark. It contained a tiny upper story, also made of sheets of bark, just large enough for two men to lie down in. Pointing to this, they intimated that the white men might sleep there, which, indeed, they were nothing loth to do.
Mat, having first placed some cool green leaves on his brother’s ankles, pulled the rugs over them, for the night was chilly, and prepared to sleep.
Before darkness had quite set in they had observed two blacks start off on their back trail towards the coast, which caused Mat to remark that he “had read that blacks never travelled at night. However,” he added, “we shall know more about it in the morning. If I’d a pipe of ’baccy now, I’d be all right, but we can’t have everything, and these chaps don’t seem a bad lot, though they’re rum ’uns to look at.”
“That they be,” said Tim; “we shall know all about ’em in a day or two. If they’d meant badly you said as they’d have killed us at once.”
“Yes, from what I’ve been told, it was a good sign their bringing up the women and children so soon.We might get them to take us to the white men they spoke about, who knows?”
The conversation, which took place as they were lying in their hut, was at this point interrupted by the sound of a high-pitched voice singing a sort of mournful ditty; presently other voices joined in.
“Hullo! let’s see what’s up,” said Tim; and from the opening in their gunyah they witnessed a curious sight.
Three or four women, or “jins,” were seated on the ground, singing and beating time with pieces of stick; a dozen little freshly-lit fires were burning in a circle, and in the midst of them were some fifteen painted warriors, white paint and red paint was daubed in regular lines over their faces and jaws, causing them to resemble so many death’s heads, whilst their bodies were streaked with broad white stripes, each rib being distinctly marked.
These white lines followed the course of their limbs, giving them the appearance of so many skeletons, as they appeared in the flickering light cast upon them.
“What a rum sight!” said Tim, who, with his brother, was intently watching these proceedings, as we have said.
“Yes, a sort of free-and-easy, I should fancy, but, look!” for as Mat spoke each warrior took up the refrain of the “jins,” and, whilst singing a hoarse chant, sprang high into the air, descending so heavily that the earth seemed to shake under them; thenshaking their spears with a quivering motion, and uttering tremendous yells, they sprang again into the air and ran “amuck” against each other.
The “Corroboree.”
The “Corroboree.”
As they pursued these ferocious antics, the sight made the white men’s blood curdle, for they thought that this must be the prelude to a rush upon themselves.
The “Corroboree,” as they afterwards found was the right name for this peculiar form of black-fellow recreation, waxed louder and fiercer, each man working himself up to a perfect frenzy, now darting in and out of the fires, and even in some cases plungingintothem, and scattering the blazing embers, till exhausted, they would here and there “fall out” and beat time to recover.
Their aspect appeared terrible and unearthly, the brothers were spell-bound, not knowing whether fury or joy was the cause of this extraordinary scene. Then the infernal din died away, only to be renewed louder than ever, as fresh warriors took the places of those pumped out, until the exhibition reached, as it seemed, a fight in terrible reality, as man closed with man, fending off each other’s spears and clubs with their “yelamans,” showing surprising feats of agility as they sprang high into the air, shouting fiercely a sort of war-cry the whole time.
The ceremony was brought to a close by all stamping their feet with heavy thuds on the ground, and then each coiled himself up by his fire, exhausted.
Our foresters breathed again.
“Well, if they ain’t the most bloodthirsty-looking devils I ever seed,” said Tim; “but I suppose it’s all sham; the women don’t dance, and ain’t painted, they’re what’s called the ‘Orkistry’ in the playhouse, I suppose.”
“Justabouta rum go,” joined in Mat; “I reckon we’re all right to sleep now, though.”
It was about midnight when the whole camp had retired to rest, so the brothers followed the general example.