about
by whites from tribe to tribe, and is used by the civilised and
semi-civilised races; but wild natives who have never seen whites use
no such cry. There were thirteen of these men. Mr. Tietkens and I went
over to them, and we had quite a friendly conference. Their leader was
an individual of a very uncertain age--he might have been forty, or he
might have been eighty (in the shade). (This was written some time
before the "Mikado" appeared.--E.G.) His head was nearly bald on the
crown, but some long grizzly locks depended below the bald patch.

The others were generally much younger, but some of them, though not
clean past their youth, yet had about them some smacks of the saltness
of age. The old man was the most self-possessed; the others displayed
a nervous tremor at our approach; those nearest us sidled closer to
their more remote and, as they no doubt thought, fortunate fellows;
they were all extremely ill-favoured in face, but their figures were
not so outres, except that they appeared emaciated and starved,
otherwise they would have been men of good bulk. Their legs were
straight, and their height would average five feet nine inches, all
being much taller than Mr. Tietkens or I. Two remained at a distance;
these had a great charge to superintend, it being no less than that of
the trained wild dogs belonging to the tribe. There were three large
dogs, two of a light sandy, and one of a kind of German colley colour.
These natives were armed with an enormous number of light barbed
spears, each having about a dozen. They do not appear to use the
boomerang very generally in this part of the continent, although we
have occasionally picked up portions of old ones in our travels. Mr.
Tietkens gave each of these natives a small piece of sugar, with which
they seemed perfectly charmed, and in consequence patted the seat of
their intellectual--that is to say, digestive--organs with great
gusto, as the saccharine morsels liquefied in their mouths. They
seemed highly pleased with the appearance and antics of my little dog,
who both sat and stood up at command in the midst of them.

They kept their own dogs away, I presume, for fear we might want to
seize them for food--wild dog standing in about the same relation to a
wild Australian native, as a sheep would to a white man. They eat all
the grown dogs they can catch, but keep a few pups to train for
hunting, and wonderful hunting dogs they are. Hence their fear of our
t