RAIN AT LAST.

May 27.

During the night the wind blew and rain fell for the first time since the party left the colony.  As we had been travelling for the last month on ground which must have become impassable after two days of wet weather, it may be imagined what satisfaction our high position gave me when I heard the rain patter.  The morning being fair I reconnoitred the course of the river and the environs of our camp, and at once selected the spot on which our tents then stood for a place of defence, and a station in which the party should be left with the cattle.  The boats were immediately lowered from the carriage, and although they had been brought 500 miles across mountain ranges and through trackless forests, we found them in as perfect a state as when they left the dockyard at Sydney.

STOCKADE ERECTED.

Our first care was to erect a strong stockade of rough logs, that we might be secure under any circumstances; for we had not asked permission to come there from the inhabitants, who had been reported to be numerous, and who would of course soon make their appearance.  All hands were set to fell trees and cut branches, and in a very short time a stockade was in progress, capable of a stout resistance against any number of natives.

NAMED FORT BOURKE.

As the position was in every respect a good one, either for its present purpose or, hereafter perhaps, for a township, and consequently was one important point gained by this expedition, I named it Fort Bourke after His Excellency the present Governor, the better to mark the epoch in the progress of interior discovery.

VISITED BY THE NATIVES.

May 28.

This morning some natives appeared on the opposite bank of the river, shouting and calling, but keeping at a respectful distance from the bullocks, some of which had already crossed.  At length they ventured over and, on my going to meet them, they sat down about 200 yards from the tents.  The party consisted of four men and a boy, followed by seven women and children who sat at a little distance behind.

MORTALITY AMONG THEM FROM SMALLPOX.

The men carried no spears and looked diminutive and simple; most of them had had the smallpox, but the marks were not larger than pin heads.  I found they had either seen or heard of Captain Sturt’s party for, pointing to the sun, they showed me that six revolutions of that source of heat had elapsed since the visit of others like us.  Other gestures, such as a reference to covering, and expressions of countenance, made their indications of the lapse of time plain enough.  It seemed to me that the disease which it was understood had raged among them (probably from the bad water) had almost depopulated the Darling, and that these people were but the remains of a tribe.  The females were numerous in proportion to the males, and they were not at all secluded by the men, as in places where the numerical proportions were different.