nd relief of obtaining help had
turned her brain. We shouted loudly to her to stop, and as our voices
fell on her ear she stood still and we approached. She looked at us with
a half-crazed expression in her eager, gleaming eyes; her cheeks were
thin and sunken, and her whole appearance was one of great wretchedness.

"We gave her some tea which she drank greedily, and it revived her
somewhat. Seeing that she had only one of her children with her, the
youngest, we asked where the other was, and she led us to a large,
hollow tree in which she placed the little girl. The poor child's feet
were so cruelly cut and blistered that she could no longer walk, and the
mother, hoping to reach home and find help, had thought best to leave
her and travel on with the other child. She had built up the opening of
the tree with logs and brush-wood in the hope of protecting the child
against the attacks of the wild dogs, but when her preparations were
complete the little girl wept so piteously that the distracted mother
could not consent to leave her alone. So she made up her mind to stay
there and die with her children.

"Just as she had reached this conclusion she heard the report of the
rifle, and with all her remaining strength she uttered the coo-ee which
brought relief to her. She did not faint or lose her self-possession,
and she astonished us all by her strength. She would not wait to allow
us to send for a dray or other conveyance, but insisted that she could
walk with us; it was a walk of seven miles, but she went on bravely,
carrying her boy, who would not leave her arms. The men by turns carried
the little girl, and offered to take the boy, but she would not give him
up.

"She solemnly declared that neither she nor the children had found
anything to eat during the time they were in the bush. On the first
night, she divided the pound of butter between the children, and ate
nothing herself. Her only sustenance for the whole time had been water,
and it was the only sustenance of the children after the butter was
consumed. Every morning they had begun to wander, hoping to reach home
before night; and every night, as the darkness closed in, they huddled
together, cold, and hungry, and footsore, on the wet ground, and with no
shelter except a few scanty bushes.

"The children slept fairly well, but the mother said she listened
through the greater part of every night, hearing the howling of the wild
dogs around them, and constant