A Single Tree Page 11
Then it came Lochie’s turn. He climbed into the crush, squeezing his legs between the beast and the mud- and dung-splattered rails. He was still wearing Percy’s coat and had a home-made cigarette on his lips. Right from the start he was gouging the beast with his heels and roaring at it. He almost forced it to its knees. Then the gate opened and out they came. He kicked it furiously, waved his hat, survived two or three bounds, then got thrown. A ripple of laughter came from the lines of people. After all that skiting! Then, before he could get on to his feet, the beast kicked up its heels and dealt him a horrible crump on the head. There was a split second’s awful silence while the beast made off down the arena and Lochie lay still, then he got up. He staggered to his feet. With the beast away down the paddock by now, Lochie was the focus of all attention. His head moved groggily while he made a gesture of looking down, then he said, ‘Where’s me bloody cigarette?’ It was perfect, right down to the bloody. Neither a stronger nor a weaker word would have done. It was a moment when the real Lochie and the self-created legend were one. There was general relief and the ignominious ride was transcended by his perfect embodiment of the hardy-bushman type.
Hail and Farewell: An Evocation of Gippsland, Heinemann, Melbourne, 1971
John F. Edey
1981
1
As soon as I returned from the war, I went to stay in the Mallee with a man who had been in my unit. He persuaded me to stay there and so I began share-farming near Nullawil. I put together a team of horses and worked very hard for quite a while.
When I first contacted the new Mallee in 1919-20 (that is, the area from Annuello and Mittyack to Speed and Tempy, mostly whip-stick Mallee) I seemed to meet with a different breed of people. Many were living in iron roofed dwellings with walls of super-phosphate bags sewn together, and whitewashed, earthen floors watered down with washing water and swept until they were hard and almost polished. The board tables were scrubbed white and there was a general air of cleanliness about. For the visitor a batch of scones would be run up and baked in the camp oven which was heated on the ever glowing coals of the outside open fire. There would be no butter except perhaps in very cool weather. Even the Coolgardie Safe took too much precious water, which invariably had to be carted long distances in kerosene tins. It was a pleasure to sit and have a cup of tea with these house-proud settlers’ wives while giving the horse a rest and then on my way again . . .
When I first went on my block, I built a hut with hessian walls and no door. I always kept an open tin of sugar on the table and early each morning a crested bower bird would fly on to the table and have a lovely time with it. He had his bower in the Mallee scrub and he collected pieces of coloured glass and china which he would move around to reflect the sun. After clearing started, the bower bird left, never to return.
2
Red Cliffs was a unique place. The settlers had been hand-picked and many of them were above average I.Q. Naturally many of their wives were highly educated girls and, whilst they were prepared to help their husbands in developing the new area, they also wanted whatever refinements of life they could get. Accordingly they formed an unusual club, the Women’s Club. They built their own concrete clubhouse which stands to this day. The building also incorporated the Baby Health Centre. Regular meetings were held at the Women’s Club and occasional dances. It certainly filled a vacuum in country life.
One of the finest fancy dress balls I have ever seen was held at Diggerland in Red Cliffs. Every conceivable costume was worn, Lord Nelson, Napoleon, Madame Pompadour, Joan of Arc, Long John Silver, a Matelot, a Cob, and none of us with any money. Ingenuity works wonders. I always attended the major dances. I would carry my dinner suit in a bag tied onto the pommel of my saddle and call into a friend’s place for a shower and change. Even in the middle of winter he was too lousy to let me have chips for the heater, so it was always a cold shower. After the dance I would pull on an old pair of trousers over the good trousers to protect them from the sweat of the horse. I often fell asleep in the saddle on the way home but the horse would always get me there.
From Lone Pine to Murray Pine: The Story of a Mallee Soldier Settler,
Sunnyland Press for John Edey, Red Cliffs, Victoria, 1981
Martin Edmond
2009
The sheet of water at Bulloo was wide and deep and full of fish and there were ingeniously constructed dams used for catching them. A large ceremonial gathering of tribes from four or five different areas was imminent and the supply party was in the way. The natives were very numerous, said Wright, and as a result he cut logs with which he would later build a stockade. Twice he tried to survey the country to the north, seeking a way through to Cooper’s Creek, but both times he was driven back by the hostility of the natives, who, upon my camping, collected in large numbers, making fires all round me and trying to entice [us] . . . by means of their Women.
The night before Beckler and his two sick men arrived, things were coming to a head: Signal fires were burning around the camp here, and the natives imitated the howl of the native dog. Wright, who seemed imperturbable, spent his time catching rats in a trap he had made. Fifty-one were killed, he observed, but this slaughter . . . did not seem to diminish either their boldness or their numbers. Beckler and his invalids came in at sunset. That night while the doctor was tending to the three dying men and Wright, who couldn’t sleep, was once more catching rats, signal fires again blazed up all around and they heard the cold, eerie, castanet-like clapping of boomerangs being struck together. Wright responded by firing a full charge of powder from a rifle and then letting off one of their biggest rockets: it soared upwards and, with a loud bang, dissolved . . . into marvellous purple, slowly falling stars. There was dead silence for about half an hour; then a murderous howling began, intermingled with curses and wild screaming. Still imitating dingo howls, the Aboriginal group split in two and moved off along the creek, one party going south, the other north.
Next morning eight armed men walked into the camp; all were freshly painted and shone with fat. Upon being told to move off they also split up, two going up the creek and six down. Immediately the men of the supply party realised that there had in fact been more intruders than they had seen: a new coat that Wright had been using as a pillow as he tried to catch up on sleep lost in the night was missing. Indeed there could be no doubt that we were surrounded by large numbers of natives. Not long after the eight departed Beckler saw a much larger group massing on the other side of the creek: all of them smeared with fat and paint and had feathers in their hair; some had large reddish dogs’ tails bound around their heads and over their ears.
Once more they came into the camp. Two men climbed up into the trees where the meat bags were hung, broke them open, pulled out the meat within, sniffed it and threw it contemptuously to the ground. The explorers’ cooking place was close to the creek and some crept up to it on hands and knees. One man lifted up the flap of Purcell’s tent and started unpacking the medical basket. Wright and Smith cleared them off with their guns raised; later they found that the cooking place had been comprehensively plundered of supplies and utensils: camp-oven, pots, bowls, plates, teapots, knives, forks, spoons, all gone.
After the plunder was over the Aboriginal leader, or lead negotiator, a man the supply party called Mr Shirt because in earlier, happier days Wright had given him a shirt and a cap, walked casually into the camp, sat down and explained that a feast was imminent, neighbouring tribes were gathering and the Europeans must leave. He was particularly annoyed that Wright had dug over some ground down by the water and planted seeds there. (As soon as the seedlings germinated, the rats ate them.) While Wright and Mr Shirt talked other individuals approached, some by sliding surreptitiously forward while sitting on the ground; one was a proud, scornful woman who periodically threw back her head and let out a ringing, derisive laugh that showed her shining rows of white teeth. When he realised what was happening Wright demanded Mr Shirt get up and go; when he ref
used Wright pulled him bodily upright by his shirt collar and pushed him back. Even as Shirt was leaving he picked up dead rats then dropped them again, motioning for Wright to pick them up for him; but Wright thought this was a ruse to get my head in an unguarded position.
Eventually, threat and counter-threat having failed to shift the position of either side, the Aboriginal men called for their weapons, which were brought to them out of the bushes by young boys. They began to clap their boomerangs together, preparing to attack. At this point Stone, the syphilitic, rallied, calling out to them in the broken voice of a dying man, using the language of the tribes of the Darling. We do not want to hurt you, he said. We will not be staying here forever. But we will never allow ourselves to be driven off. It gave the attackers pause but only for a moment. The stand-off resumed and lasted for about three hours before Wright and his active men – there were only three of them, himself, Beckler and Smith, because Hodgkinson and Belooch were still bringing up the rest of the camels from Kooliatto Creek – lost their patience and physically evicted the sixteen or seventeen indigenous people from the camp. Later they found that twelve rats Beckler had skinned and gutted in preparation for cooking had been placed on an anthill and so ruined.That night Stone died; the next day, after burying him, the supply party built a stockade from the timber Wright had previously cut.
It is notable and curious that both here and at Kooliatto Creek the Europeans manhandled Aboriginal people without suffering any physical retaliation. It was in fact remarkable how much violence was threatened on both sides and how little actually occurred. There was even one occasion, at Kooliatto Creek, when a boy came back into the camp minutes after Beckler had physically evicted him and asked for fire; Beckler gave him a box of matches. The confidence of the Europeans was based on their possession of guns but what was the source of Aboriginal confidence? Why were they so sure they could come and go, ransack and pilfer, with impunity? Was it because they knew they would in the end prevail?
The day after the stockade was finished, Purcell also died. He had not been able to eat for some time, or even raise his head from his pillow without fainting. Beckler was woken in the morning and went in to see him; the cook said he was having trouble breathing and asked for water. Fifteen minutes later his head fell to one side, he groaned and died. They sewed him into his blanket but before he could be buried in the hard ground next to where Stone was laid, the Aboriginal people came back in numbers. They gathered around Stone’s grave and became most insulting in their demeanor. One picked up a dead rat and made a harangue upon it; then he threw it at the Europeans. They also flung dirt and stones from the grave into the air and gestured with sticks, evidently mimicking the erection of the stockade. The Europeans understood them to be saying that they would soon share the fate that had overtaken Stone. Wright continued to practise forbearance; I was very unwilling to fire at them, and allowed them to throw several sticks at us rather than commence actual hostilities. By noon they had concluded their demonstrations . . . When darkness fell they began to dig Purcell’s grave. It was the night of 24 April. He was buried at eight next morning. Now, they were only waiting for Becker to die.
The Supply Party: Ludwig Becker on the Burke and Wills Expedition,
East Street Publications, Adelaide, 2009
Ray Ericksen
1972
I soon learnt more about the man I was travelling with and I liked what I discovered. He seemed to have many of the qualities which are best explorers had on which our best bushman also exhibit: a quietness inside; confidence, ingenuity and self-reliance; a philosophical acceptance of danger and a realistic appreciation of risk; a high level of tolerance for discomfort, illness and injury; and, as significant as anything else, a sense of satisfaction in the process of travelling itself.
More than this, Tom Murray, unlike most explorers, had been born in the country and has spent enough years in the desert to accept it as it is and to think of it as his own. There were many signs, in talk and in action, of the extent to which he had identified himself with this region, harsh though much of it is. He knew it as well as I knew my suburban backyard, and he was as much at home in it as I have ever been in Melbourne. He was not an alien intruder nervously traversing a threatening environment. He looked unmoved as if he belonged, as if he were a natural part of it all; the complex, infinitely varied and intensely alive region we persist in calling a desert.
When a man belongs, the trees and shrubs are the natural clothing of the red sand, and not simply exotic sites or barriers to progress. They offer shade and fuel and a reassurance that the steady fertility of the region many believe to be barren. The bush creatures are more than intriguing curiosities or threats to comfort. They are familiar fellow inhabitants of the man’s homeland, sharing the space with him and easing the strain of solitude. Even the flies, those obscene and unrelenting pests, and the ants that cover the ground, however bitterly to be cursed, are also assertions of the life around, and in the end they come to be accepted as such.
West of Centre: a Journey of Discovery into the Heartland of Australia,
Heinemann, London, 1972
George Essex Evans
1901
The Women of the West
They left the vine-wreathed cottage and the mansion on the hill,
The houses in the busy streets where life is never still,
The pleasures of the city, and the friends they cherished best:
For love they faced the wilderness – the Women of the West.
The roar, and rush, and fever of the city died away,
And the old-time joys and faces – they were gone for many a day;
In their place the lurching coach-wheel, or the creaking bullock chains,
O’er the everlasting sameness of the never-ending plains.
In the slab-built, zinc-roofed homestead of some lately-taken run,
In the tent beside the bankment of a railway just begun,
In the huts on new selections, in the camps of man’s unrest,
On the frontiers of the Nation, live the Women of the West.
The red sun robs their beauty, and, in weariness and pain,
The slow years steal the nameless grace that never comes again;
And there are hours men cannot soothe, and words men cannot say –
The nearest woman’s face may be a hundred miles away.
The wide Bush holds the secrets of their longings and desires,
When the white stars in reverence light their holy altar-fires,
And silence, like the touch of God, sinks deep into the breast –
Perchance He hears and understands the Women of the West.
For them no trumpet sounds the call, no poet plies his arts –
They only hear the beating of their gallant, loving hearts.
But they have sung with silent lives the song all songs above –
the holiness of sacrifice, the dignity of love.
Well have we held our fathers’ creed. No call has passed us by.
We faced and fought the wilderness, we sent our sons to die.
And we have hearts to do and dare, and yet, o’er all the rest,
The hearts that made the Nation were the Women of the West.
The Secret Key and Other Verses, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1906
John Evans
1999
The Evans were conservative farmers in the best sense. They had spent three generations cutting, burning and knocking down mallee like everyone else to plant wheat. But by the 1950s they were setting aside old growth, concerned about the loss of breeding habitat for parrots. In 1971, father Tom upset some in the district by stating the obvious – “the northern Murray Mallee is definitely marginal land due to the uncertain seasons”. In 1983 when they signed their Heritage Agreement, they were denigrated locally as “The Greenies”. But times have changed. As other States still grapple with – and largely fail to grasp – the nettle of land clearning, South Australia has
moved on to set up a pioneering model of government and property owners cooperatively managing lands for production and conservation. For example, with significant patches of the Murray Mallee now protected under Heritage Agreements, John and his son Michael Evans are part of a group of 15 landowners who have joined together to control foxes, rabbits, feral cats – and protect the increasingly threatened mallee fowl.
I was 13 when I started really cutting. There were dozens and dozens of others that were doing exactly the same thing at the same age. Everyone had to do it for a living, that was the way it was. That was the time of the bad drought that started in 1943. All our draught horses had to be shot because there was no feed. Out of 850 sheep, all that came through was 200. We were cutting wood to pay the store bills, rent, and rates.
The best I ever cut was three ton in a day. My brother Les could cut quite a bit more than that, but don’t worry, we didn’t average that every day.
It was a pretty sickening job, especially when you were young. It wasn’t the sort of thing that you thought farming was all about, but still it had to be done. The whole district was on cutting wood. At that stage too, what we call the mallee stumps, or mallee roots, they became prime firewood. In previous years, there was no sale for the stumps – I’m going back to the early 1920s. A terrible lot had to be carted off the ploughed ground. People built horse yards, sheep yards, and even stables with stump walls to get rid of them. In the late 1940s when mallee stumps became valuable, a lot of those old stables and horse yards were pulled down and the stumps sold.