Our camp consisted of the usual tents and bough-shades and for the first, and probably the only, time in our lives we cooked our pots on a golden fireplace.  To protect the fire from the wind, so that a good pile of ashes should collect for baking purposes, we had made a semicircular wall of stones.  The nearest available stones, quartz boulders from the blow, were used, and so it came about that we had a gold-studded fireplace!  We used to have a curious visitor from the caves—­a small black cat, which was tame enough to wander between our legs as we sat round the fire, but too wary to be caught.  I can hardly imagine a prospector carrying a cat as companion, and yet how else did it get there?  Its shyness inclined us to think it had strayed from civilisation.  Jim tried to catch it one evening, and not only got scratched and bitten for his trouble, but so startled the beast that it never returned.  Our party was now increased to five; for an extra hand, Alfred Morris, had been engaged.  Between us the duties of the day’s work were divided.

Our daily labours included hunting up the camels, lest they strayed or were stolen, cutting timber for mining or firewood, packing water from the rocks five miles away, and working on the mine.

I had occasion to make a journey to Lawlers, where a Warden, Mr. Clifton, had lately been established, and I mention here an illustration of one of the many intelligent traits in the character of camels.

Not wishing to follow the road in its many turns from water to water, I cut through the bush for some fifty miles.  The first part was over hard, stony ground, then came sand, then more stones, and then I struck the road again about two miles from Lawlers.  I stayed there two or three days, intending to return on my tracks.  Wishing to test the intelligence of my camel Satan I allowed him a free rein, either to keep on the track or turn off for a short cut.  As soon as we came to the spot where we had first struck the road, he turned into the bush without hesitation with his nose for home.  After some eight miles of stones, on which I could distinguish no trail, we came to the sand, and at once I could see our former tracks right ahead, which little Satan had followed with the precision of a black-fellow.

In repasssing old camping-places on the road, camels will often stop, and look surprised if made to go further.  They have, too, an excellent idea of time, and know very well when the day’s march should come to an end.  With what sad reproof they look at one with their great, brown eyes, that say, as plainly as eyes can speak, “What! going on?  I am so tired.”  I fancy the reason that camels are so often described as stupid and vicious, and so forth, is that they are seen, as a rule, in large mobs under the care of Indian or other black drivers, whose carelessness and cruelty (so far as my experience goes) are unspeakable.  For that reason I never have had an Afghan driver in my employ, nor can I see any advantage in employing one, unless it be on the score of cheapness.  Camels are infinitely better managed and treated by white men—­of course, I speak within my own knowledge of Australia—­and in consequence their characters develop, and they are properly appreciated.