to move my home farther north, and
eventually settled down with my family (two children--a boy and a
girl--had been born to me during my residence on the shores of the
lagoon) in a beautiful mountainous and tropical region 200 or 300 miles
to the north. It was my intention only to have made a temporary stay
here, but other ties came, and my little ones were by no means strong
enough to undertake any such formidable journey as I had in
contemplation. I also made the fatal mistake of trying to bring my
offspring up differently from the other savage children. But I must
relate here an incident that happened on our journey north. Yamba came
to me one day positively quivering with excitement and terror, and said
she had found some strange tracks, apparently of some enormous beast--a
monster so fearful as to be quite beyond her knowledge.

She took me to the spot and pointed out the mysterious tracks, which I
saw at once were those of camels. I do not know why I decided to follow
them, because they must have been some months old. Probably, I
reflected, I might be able to pick up something on the tracks which would
be of use to me. At any rate, we did follow the tracks for several
days--perhaps a fortnight--and found on the way many old meat-tins, which
afterwards came in useful as water vessels. One day, however, I pounced
upon an illustrated newspaper--a copy of the Sydney _Town and Country
Journal_, bearing some date, I think in 1875 or 1876. It was a complete
copy with the outer cover. I remember it contained some pictures of
horse-racing--I believe at Paramatta; but the "Long Lost Relative" column
interested me most, for the very moment I found the paper I sat down in
the bush and began to read this part with great eagerness. I could read
English fairly well by this time, and as Yamba was also tolerably
familiar with the language, I read the paper aloud to her. I cannot say
she altogether understood what she heard, but she saw that I was
intensely interested and delighted, and so she was quite content to stay
there and listen. You will observe that in all cases, the very fact that
_I_ was pleased was enough for Yamba, who never once wavered in her
fidelity and affection. Altogether we spent some weeks following up
these tracks, but, of course, never came up with the caravan of camels,
which must have been some months ahead of us. Yamba at length appeared
to be a good deal wearied at my persistency in follow