he
was well able to meet, but because, as had already been told to the
world, he had found the dead bodies of his four gallant comrades, where
they had perished of cold and hunger on the way.

The first two bodies, those of Kinney and Taylor, were found some 35
miles from Macpherson, and those of Carter and Fitzgerald within a score
of miles of that place. Only a short day's run from Macpherson. If those
who were there had only known, how speedily they would have gone to the
rescue! It appears clear from what Fitzgerald had written in his diary,
the first date in which was December 21, 1910, and the last February 5,
1911, that not many days after Indian Esau had left, it became apparent
that Carter had over-estimated his ability to remember the route which
he had only passed over once a few years before, and that the reverse
way. Many landmarks may have been removed by fire and otherwise since
that time. Poor Carter! I sometimes feel he suffered more than any of
them when he found that he could not find the way he thought he knew.
How hard he tried day after day, leaving camp with one or other of his
companions and going up one river after the other, only to find that
they ended as "blind alleys," along which they could proceed no farther.
And so Fitzgerald has to write on January 17: "Carter is hopelessly lost
and does not know one river from another. We have only 10 lbs. of flour,
8 lbs. of bacon and some dried fish. My last hope is gone, and the only
thing I can do is to return and kill some of the dogs to feed the others
and ourselves. We have now been a week looking for a river to take us
over the divide, but there are dozens of rivers and I am at a loss."

One asks why they had not turned back days before, and as soon as they
found the route uncertain. The answer is that it was not the Police way
to turn back when they were out on a definite errand. These men were of
the same calibre as the young constable in the foothill country who was
caught in a blizzard while out on duty, and on whose body, as already
quoted, was found a paper with the words: "Lost. Horse dead. Am trying
to push ahead. Have done my best."

But Fitzgerald was not alone, and had to save his men if he could.
Kinney and Taylor, less strong than the others, suffered from cold and
severe pains, the results perhaps of the dog meat and dog liver diet.
The dogs would not eat this food, and so the men gave them the fish they
had for their own use. S