Bimerah — Stonehenge — A Hard Struggle — Jundah
WHEN we arrived at Bimerah, we had, roughly speaking, completed an in and out journey of 1,300 miles from Normanton; therefore we felt not only entitled to, but thoroughly inclined for a spell. And a more comfortable and hospitable resting-place than Bimerah could not possibly have been chosen in the whole length and breadth of the continent. Long, cool, creeper-covered verandahs, in which to idle away warm mornings, an artistic drawing-room, a piano (hitherto an unknown luxury), good cooking, and last, but by no means least, female society. The lady of the house was an ideal hostess, and one cannot say too much in favour of the wife who follows her lord and master into such exile; for the country around Bimerah is lonely and uninteresting to the last degree. Endless mirage-covered plains, and stern forbidding mountains stretching away to the south-east, constitute the only view. The keynote to it all is Desolation.
When we arrived the drought had laid her finger on Bimerah with crushing results, and the cares and anxieties of the manager were endless. Fortunately he was a man of philosophic temperament, who did his level best, and knew that no man could possibly do more. To add to his worries, however, shearing was in full progress, in a rough shed constructed of uprights and boughs, about a mile from the station house.
Shearing brings together a strange collection of men, not only of shearers and rouseabouts (as the additional helpers are called), but of itinerant vagabonds generally. Let me instance some. On the day following our arrival, just about sundown, three men make their appearance walking and leading a pack-horse. They say they are acrobats, and they style themselves the Royal Western Queensland Circus Company.
In the evening they give an exhibition of their skill before the shearers in the stockyard, under the glare of blazing torches. Though a poor enough exhibition, the enthusiasm it evokes is extraordinary. Next morning they break camp, and disappear again over the plains towards the next station, thirty miles distant, to repeat the performance. And this life, they say, they have been leading for many years.
No sooner are they out of sight than another little band of wayfarers puts in an appearance. This one consists of a police trooper, a prisoner, and a black tracker. The prisoner rides between his two captors, and is securely handcuffed. On interrogating the officer in charge, he says he is taking him to Longreach (distant about a hundred miles), for trial, having already brought him nearly a hundred, watching him continually, and sleeping handcuffed to him at night. They pull up near the stockyard for lunch, after which they requisition fresh horses, and again wind their dismal way across the plains. There is no false shame about the prisoner, he only appears sulky and says he wishes they’d give him ‘a bit better moke, and he’d give’em a run for their money, anyhow!’ But they have met his like before, and decline to furnish him with the necessary opportunity.
The great festival on an Australian station is the arrival of the mail, weekly, fortnightly, or monthly, as the case may be. At Bimerah it arrives weekly, the mail-coach being a buckboard buggy drawn by five strong horses. Anxiously is it looked for, and many are the surmises as to its fate if it does not run up to proper time! After the bags are opened, the entire station becomes a letter and paper reading community for hours.
But everything must come to an end, even a pleasant rest, and at length we are reluctantly compelled to bid our hospitable friends ‘goodbye,’ and once more take up our march. The ladies of the family set out the same morning, driving themselves, to attend a dance at a neighbouring station some fifty miles away. They think no more of the distance than an English lady would of paying an afternoon call in the next street.
Leaving Bimerah, our track lies along the foot of, and eventually across, the Johnstone Range, over open downs and dense mulga ridges, to a miserable little apology for a township, called Stonehenge. The route is uninteresting to the last degree, and we notice with regret that, however much we may have enjoyed the hospitality of Bimerah, Cyclops and Polyphemus do not show any signs of having benefited by it too.
How and why Stonehenge received its name must ever remain a mystery. It is as like the real Stonehenge as a log hut is like the Tower of London, but at least I will do it the justice to say, that, next to Boulia and Windorah, it is the hottest and the least desirable township through which we had the misfortune to pass. It contains about ten houses, of which perhaps two are grog shanties, the balance being made up of a police hut, a couple of stores, a butcher’s and blacksmith’s shop, and two or three private dwellings.
Though we were only there a few minutes, Mr. Pickwick found time to make himself objectionable to the dogs of the place, a number of whom clustered round the buggy and barked defiance at him as he sat on the top of the luggage. In a moment of mistaken enthusiasm he missed his footing and fell overboard, to dangle by his chain six inches, off the ground, the prey and derision of his enemies. When we rescued him, and set him back in his place, he sported flies with a melancholy air for hours afterwards. His pride had received a fall, as well as his body.
In spite of the blandishments of the inhabitants we were not to be persuaded to remain in Stonehenge, but pushed on over another spur of the range, to our old friend the Thompson River, in whose dry bed we were eventually obliged to camp, contenting ourselves with the thick pea-soup like water we were lucky enough to find in a solitary pool there.
It was a dreary spot, made up of dead timber, dried flood wreck, and Polyganum. As usual Mr. Pickwick did not seem at all happy in his mind; the mosquitoes must have found out his map of Asia, and bitten him there, for he moaned so diligently all night that we were compelled to argue with him at repeated intervals.
In addition to our other troubles ‘The Bolivar’ was becoming a source of constant anxiety to us: the crack in her pole was spreading ominously, her wheels had to be continually taken off and soaked in water, while it was necessary to insert leather washers in the wheel boxes, on an average, once every day, to prevent her going completely to pieces.
When, next morning, We resumed our march, it was only to observe with alarm that our horses were not only more tucked up than ever, but that they were growing exceedingly leg-weary. Indeed, considering the work they had accomplished, and the heat and the scanty food and water on which they had done it, it was not to be wondered at that they showed signs of failing. For this reason our progress was necessarily slow, while our minds were filled with the gravest apprehensions. The country was growing unmistakably poorer ahead. For miles and miles only parched earth met the eye, not a blade of grass could be discovered, and whenever creeks or waterholes were met with, nothing but a dry heat-cracked surface presented itself.
For five hours we toiled on in this hopeless fashion, as miserable as a pair of bandicoots. At the end of that time we had barely completed a distance of fourteen miles. Then, seeing that our animals absolutely could go no further, we were compelled, whether we liked it or not, to call a halt; this meant a dry............