-glass I had hanging up in the hut near my
hammock. She thoughtlessly took it down and held it close up to her
face. She trembled, felt the surface of the glass, and then looked
hurriedly on the back. One long, last, lingering look she gave, and then
flew screaming out of the hut.

Oddly enough, she overcame her fears later, and, woman-like, would come
and look in the mirror for an hour at a stretch, smacking her lips all
the while in wonderment, and making most comical grimaces and contortions
to try various effects. Her husband, however (Gunda, as I called him),
was very differently affected, for the moment his wife showed him his own
reflection in the glass he gave a terrific yell and bolted to the other
end of the little island, in a state of the most abject terror. He never
quite overcame his terror and distrust of the mirror, which he evidently
considered possessed of life, and in reality a kind of spirit to be
feared and avoided.

But, of course, the two boys found the glass a never-ending source of
amazement and wonder, and were not in the least afraid of it after the
first natural shock of surprise. Altogether, I thanked God for sending
me my new companions; and, as you may suppose, they afforded me as much
entertainment and gratification as I and my belongings did them.

Every evening, before retiring to rest, the family squatted round the
fire and indulged in a mournful kind of chant--singing, as I afterwards
learnt, the wonders they had seen on the white man's island; my mirror
coming in for special mention. This was the only approach to a
"religious service" I ever saw, and was partly intended to propitiate or
frighten away the spirits of the departed, of whom the Australian blacks
have a great horror.

The blacks had been with me two or three weeks, when one evening the man
approached and intimated in unmistakable terms that he wanted to get away
from the island and return to his own land. He said he thought he and
his family could easily return to their friends on the mainland by means
of the catamaran that had brought them.

And Yamba, that devoted and mysterious creature, solemnly pointed out to
me a glowing star far away on the horizon. There, she said, lay the home
of her people. After this I was convinced that the mainland could not be
more than a couple of hundred miles or so away, and I determined to
accompany them on the journey thither, in the hope that this might form
one of the s