men calling, and women
laughing; many voices I heard but you only I see."

"And only I am here. The wind must have stirred the branches of the
balah trees, and you must have thought it was the wailing of children,
the laughing of the gouggourgahgah you heard, and thought it the
laughter of women and mine must have been the voice as of men that you
heard. Alone in the bush, as the shadows fall, a man breeds strange
fancies. See by the light of this fire, where are your fancies now? No
women laugh, no babies cry, only I, Weedah, talk." As Weedah was
talking he kept edging the stranger towards the fire; when they were
quite close to it, he turned swiftly, seized him, and threw him right
into the middle of the blaze. This scene was repeated time after time,
until at last the ranks of the black fellows living round the camp of
Weedah began to get thin.

Mullyan, the eagle hawk, determined to fathom the mystery, for as yet
the black fellows had no clue as to how or where their friends had
disappeared. Mullyan, when Beeargah, his cousin, returned to his camp
no more, made up his mind to get on his track and follow it, until at
length he solved the mystery. After following the track of Beeargah, as
he had chased the kangaroo to where he had slain it, on he followed his
homeward trail. Over stony ground he tracked him, and through sand,
across plains, and through scrub. At last in a scrub and still on the
track of Beeargah, he heard the sounds of many voices, babies crying,
women singing, men talking. Peering through the bush, finding the track
took him nearer the spot whence came the sounds, he saw the grass
humpies. "Who can these be?" he thought. The track led him right into
the camp, where alone Weedah was to be seen. Mullyan advanced towards
him and asked where were the people whose voices he had heard as he
came through the bush.

Weedah said: "How can I tell you? I know of no people; I live alone."

"But," said Mullyan, the eagle hawk, "I heard babies crying, women
laughing, and men talking, not one but many."

"And I alone am here. Ask of your cars what trick they played you, or
perhaps your eyes fail you now. Can you see any but me? Look for
yourself."

"And if, as indeed it seems, you only are here, what did you with
Beeargah my cousin, and where are my friends? Many are their trails
that I see coming into this camp, but none going out. And if you alone
live here you alone can answer me."

"What know I of you