g I ascertained that such had really
been her occupation all night; for the purpose of keeping the body from
harm, she avowed, but, I am inclined to think, much more from fear of
sleeping in the neighbourhood of a dead body, for the blacks are
dreadfully superstitious, and frightened to death of ghosts.

At daylight we were lucky enough to find a tree that had been blown
down in the late hurricane, leaving a hollow where its roots had been
torn out of the ground. In this natural grave we laid the poor
trooper, wrapped in his bark shell, and, having raised a pile of stones
upon the spot, of such dimensions as to preclude the probability of the
body being disturbed by dingoes, we went on our way, silent and
melancholy.

AN AUSTRALIAN SEARCH PARTY--IV.

BY CHARLES H. EDEN.

OUR next day was a repetition of the last; camps in abundance, but no
blacks, and we had as yet seen no signs of the Townsville party. At
night we camped by the side of a large creek, and, after supper, were
lying down, with the intention of making up for the broken slumbers of
the previous night, when Ferdinand, who had moved higher up the stream
to get a private eel for himself and his lady, came back and shook
Dunmore, saying--

"Many big fellow fire sit down up creek."

We were on our feet in a moment, and, stealing quietly through the
bush, soon saw the glare, and on our nearer approach, could make out
many recumbent figures round the fire, and one man passing to and fro,
on guard.

"By Jove! it's the Cleveland Bay mob," said Dunmore; "we must take
care they don't fire into us. Lie down, or get behind trees, all you
fellows, and I'll hail them."

"Holloa there!" he cried, when we had all "planted" (in Australian
parlance signifying "concealed") ourselves. "Don't fire, we're
Cardwellites!"

In a moment the sentry's rifle was at his shoulder, pointed in the
direction whence the voice came; but it was my old friend Abiram Hills,
ex-mayor of Bowen, a thorough bushman, and possessed of great nerve,
whose turn it then happened to be to keep watch over his slumbering
companions. As quickly as it had been raised, his rifle fell into the
hollow of his arm, and shouting out, "Get up, you fellows, here are the
Rockingham Bayers!" he rushed forward, and in a moment was shaking
hands with Dunmore, while the sleepers, uncertain whether it was an
alarm, stood rubbing their eyes, and handling their carbines so
ominously as they peered int