The Land of the Hibiscus Blossom
James Hume Nisbet (1888)
Country of origin: Australia
Available texts by the same author here
XXVIII. A Boat Voyage.
HECTOR and Collins were, after all, fated to get their vessel towed into the river as they had hoped, not an easy task in this land of cruel surprises, when, for all they knew to the contrary, their landing may have been watched by unseen crafty eyes; however, as far as their short survey entitled them to judge, this portion of the river was a low-lying, swampy, fever-infested, but uninhabited jungle.Mud was the most plentiful provision of nature--mud, black and slimy--from which the scrubby mangroves cropped up and swarmed about in a serpentine fashion, with a barren level behind, devoid of any larger tree than low, unwholesome-looking bushes.
During this survey they started a drove of small kangaroo-rats, a few of which they secured while the rest scuttled away; also, as they wandered along the banks, at distant points they could see the unwieldy form of the alligator as he rose from his soft mud lair in the sun and flopped quickly out of sight into the deep water-hole; they could not get near enough to shoot, for these animals are very shy of human beings when in numbers, but they saw no snakes although it seemed just the place for them to be, nor did any bush-birds rise on the wing;--a deserted, silent, and forsaken shore; not any noise producer.
By sundown they had the vessel towed to the cove which they designed as a harbour, and made fast, both by her anchors and with strong wire ropes, to stumps on either side of the river. Of course they could not hide her, even if they desired such a thing, but as they had resolved to risk her during their absence to whoso chanced to come that way, they only took ordinary precaution against the wind or tide carrying her away, and left the rest in the hands of Providence.
An anxious night passed, but without incident; all through it they were buried in the midst of a dense white, bone-chilling river fog, which made them glad to see the sun when at last it broke through and scattered the mist, although it took a good hour of hard exertion to get the blood warmed up.
At mid-day they were ready to start on their journey, having put up what provisions they could carry into separate packs, so much to each man, after which they made their observations, and, as far as they could judge from the sextant and chart, fixed their locality.
They had drifted considerably west of Mai-Kassa, in one of the smaller outlets of the Fly River, as yet unnoted on their chart.
"I tell you what, old chap," observed Hector, "we cannot do better than stick to our small boat and pull up as far as we can, it looks pretty clear, as far as we can judge, and from its course should take us into the Fly about Ellengowan Island."
"Right you are, mate; I'd have proposed the same thing; it is easier to travel that way, and we can stow a deal more away."
So in about half an hour all were ready, and after a hasty dinner of what was left on board, they started on their journey.
"I reckon the natives won't find much to steal on board, even if they do visit this part," said Hector, as they pulled round a bend of the river and saw the last of their little craft as the bushes covered her up.
The estuary which they had now entered seemed to be one of many mouths of a considerable-sized river, for after rowing along for an hour or two with little change of scenery, the mangroves began to grow thinner on the banks, with interspaces through which they had glimpses of country beyond.
Flat stretches of uneven country, with sand diversified with scrubby--grey patches of grass, or oily-looking swampy places, where the stagnant water was constantly evaporating under that blazing sun, and sending forth noisome gases which crept over the surface of the river unseen except for the quivering of the atmosphere by day, and gathering into those miasma vapours during the night.
Both Hector and Collins were well inured to the coast fever of these undrained shores, while the coloured boys with them do not seem to be so quickly inoculated by fever germs as Europeans; still that all felt the deadly and insidious influence more or less the apathetic strokes of the oars proved.
While the mangrove forests lasted this lazy feeling seemed harder to resist, while to continue conversation or even reply to questions seemed to be too great an effort for the tongue to make; they lighted their pipes only to let them go out again, and worked their oars as if they were playing with the water instead of pushing against it.
Still they made progress, for at this point the sea tide seemed much stronger than the river current, and it was on the rise as they started; so that it would have floated them inland even if they had rested entirely. As it was they aided the tide a little, while it did the rest to help them along.
Past those twisted and bare roots like snakes of various sizes coiled about one another, amongst that oozing inky mud which stained the briny greenish water which glided up after them to meet the sluggish fresh current; sun-bleached roots of the shade of those sea-snakes to be seen so often floating in the gulf when the seas are calm and clear met their gaze, with the turn they had rounded, and at the next bend blue like indigo and indefinite with the broad vagueness of that vaporous scumbling.
Past that deadly slime with the deep shadows behind cast by that raw green and blue black, amongst which large droves of rats scampered as they rushed dripping out of the brackish water, and made long ruts in their passage. At times also they rowed very near to the saurian monsters who were caught napping, and who woke up to see the uncommon sight just in time to be able to hobble down with awkward rollings, but in terrible consternation and haste, and with a wild splashing into the friendly tide, raising for yards about them foul stains of stirred-up mud, and leaving on the banks from where they had been disturbed a deep imprint in reverse of their mail-clad bodies.
Above them the sky was blue and cloudless, with the sun white and passionate in its intensity, but casting little colour upon the banks of rhizophora; the spot where it seemed specially to concentrate its full effulgence being the dingey in which they languidly moved their arms, and which appeared to float like a white splash upon the green-grey surface. Their line of vision was very circumscribed, they could see only a straight line of discoloured water, edged with mauve-like banks of purple slime, broken up with distorted limbs and ropes of exposed roots, which crossed and recrossed amongst the mud banks and unreflecting waters, and terminated in that wilderness of unkempt greenery.
No wind came to fan their throbbing heads now that they were shut in from the sea, while perfect clouds of insect life--tiger mosquitoes, and gnats--hung around them, dinning into their cars their savage war--cries, and biting till the blood came, even through their thick flannel shirts.
"I wouldn't mind much to be out of this, Collins," observed Hector, taking off his hat to strike a circle of his tormentors.
"They do bite," replied Collins, striking upon his cheek with his open hand; "make us active whether we will or not, but I fancy another half--hour will clear us of this jungle."
"It is clearing; make way, lads, before the tide turns," he added, addressing the rowers.
A little more energy was here put into the oarstrokes, and they moved faster round the bend and into an open space.
Hitherto the estuary had been turning left and right alternately, yet still tending north-easterly in its general direction, with narrow and shaded creeks leading from it, amongst the mangroves. But now they were approaching a large basin, round which the bushes grew very scarce and undersized, leaving large tracks of mud and sand between, the mud clinging mostly about its favourite roots.
A shallow basin of spreading, mud-disturbed water, in which the dingey continually struck against stumps, or ran aground and had to be pushed off again into the central stream, which they could not always see to follow.
Here they could look down upon the mangrove fringe which hid the ocean from them, and breathe more freely, as across the flats they got the benefit of the ocean breeze, before which the ruthless hordes of mosquitoes were driven back to their twilight haunts, although a few daring ones still clung swinging on their long thin legs to the sheltered sides of hats and shirts.
In this basin they rested to ascertain which was the true river, for the tide here evidently met the current on equal terms. All round about them were wide openings, some distinctly leading to the ocean, while others tended inland, to meet the river further up.
After a few experiments with some pieces of wood, which they floated to find out which estuary had the strongest inland current, they decided upon the one verging the most westward as being the true one, almost at random.
"It cannot go far west," cried Collins, "it must back on its course and join the Fly somewhere." So westward they rowed with a fresh breeze behind them and banks growing firmer and more sloping as they advanced.
Soon the sun went down full in the backs of the rowers, and dead in the face of Collins, who was steering;--a golden orb, which sank behind distant trees, the purple tops of which only they saw beyond the banks, which were every mile becoming higher, and more diversified in their character; in parts leading off into large tracts of dense forest-land, while at others they had a clear outline of sky behind, with an occasional gum or cotton-tree stretching out bare limbs.
At dark they brought up against the first sign of natives, namely about a dozen deserted hut-graves, which had been built on a flat portion of the banks--silent huts standing up grimly against the twilight, and slowly going to pieces on their piles. Scarcely a roof but was broken in parts, with the frame-work showing under the dropping thatch, proving that they had not been used since before the last rains.
A background of sombre forest stretched out behind a clearing of about half-a-mile of grass-covered plain, the grass being green and rank like rushes growing over a swamp, and here and there were traces of what had once been gardens, but the old banana-trees had all been destroyed so that only young shoots were springing up, not yet the length for bearing fruit.
"A big fight has been here at one time," said Collins, looking round, "and one tribe the less in New Guinea! I think we'll be safe enough to roost here for the night."
They made their boat fast to one of the posts of an old landing-place, and all got out, glad enough to stretch their cramped arms and legs, the Malay boys carrying the provisions, and the two leaders going about examining the houses in order to fix upon the most habitable one for sleeping-quarters. At last they decided upon one a trifle less dilapidated than the others, and set to work clearing it out from its present tenants, the fire-dried mummies of a family of five, the mother and four children evidently, with the remains of what might have been the grandmother; but the father evidently had been killed in the open, and his carcase utilized another way, as they saw no trace of him about.
With little ceremony they cleared out these relics of humanity, pitching them carelessly from the platform where they lay half sticking out from the dank grass, like pieces of charred logs. The cooking utensils, spears, and decaying pieces of matting they huddled into a corner, spreading out their own blankets instead.
After these preparations were complete they went down to their boat, and dragging it amongst the long grasses further to shore, covered it up so that it would not be easily seen from the opposite bank--at this space a distance of about thirty feet.
After a brief discussion, it was thought best not to light a fire, in case in the darkness--now gathering fast--enemies might be about and see it; so they contented themselves for the night with filling their billies from the river and qualifying their drink with a little of the rum which they had brought; this, with ship biscuit and a tin of preserved meat, constituted their supper, after which each lit his pipe and laid himself down on his blanket, puffing in silence, with the exception of one of the coloured boys, who had been appointed to the first watch.
Hector and Collins were old and good friends, but they were both quietly inclined, not much given to speaking at the best of times, but thoroughly appreciating and understanding each other's qualities, and the good faith which was between them; they knew one another's stories, and having no fresh plans to air, lay in a harmonic silence, looking through the rugged doorway towards the darkly clear sky, from which the crescent moon--a thin half-ring--was now shining with her attendant star, with the sleepy contentment of the smokers. Outside, by the corner of the platform, the Malay sailor squatted listening and watching.
"Whirr!" A flying fox darted past his broad nose and startled the watcher. It had come from the forest on the other side of the river, and was going to old haunts in the destroyed native garden.
The night was warm as yet, but before long the sea-breeze died away and the night-air sighed amongst the bushes and brought on its wings the valley-fogs, which sailed down the river's breast and spread over the banks until the land was veiled in white and the posts of the platform seemed to be rising out of water.
A low snorting and moving about at the foot of the posts startled him once more into wakefulness.
"Boss Collins, some one outside," he whispered, creeping inside on all fours and putting his mouth close to the ear of his master.
Collins raised himself up on his elbow to listen.
"Wild pigs grubbing after the corpses. Take one of the spears over there in the corner and let drive in the direction of the grunts, you may kill something for breakfast; but whether you strike or miss, don't shoot."
And the skipper lay down once more on his back, sucking away at his dead pipe.
The watcher passed over to the corner and groped about till his hand encountered a bundle of spears which had been left to guard the mummies, from which he selected three, and creeping out silently, sat down to listen spear in hand.
The snorting and snuffing still continued at the foot of the posts, so taking as fair aim as he can judge from the locality of the sounds, he pitches his three spears in quick succession, the action at once followed by a chorus of unearthly shrieks and a stampede of many cleft hoofs in the direction of the forest, the chorus growing fainter as they reach it, while at the foot of the posts he can hear a sound like an asthmatic fat woman gasping for breath.
He has evidently wounded more than one of the herd by those chance javelin-throws, and wounded one to the death.
Collins hears the sound also, and comes to the door stretching himself lazily.
"There snorts our breakfast if I don't much mistake. Get me some more of the spears, lad, and let's finish him."
The Malay gets a couple more from the inside, the others never stirring, although he treads over them as he passes and half crushes an arm under his naked foot. Sailors wake only when their watch is up, or when they are called to face a danger.
Armed with the spears, Collins feels his way down the ladder and over to where the sounds are still continuing.
When he thinks himself near enough he lunges out, going wide of the mark the first and second stabs, but being rewarded by a gurgling shriek the third, upon which he draws back his barbed spear and plunges again and again without any response; the snorting is no longer heard.
"Come down and help me, Jack," he says, as he stumbles forward and gropes about for his victim. He feels along the spear to where it is still sticking till he comes to the object.
"Ugh!" His hand touches the shrivelled-up breast of the dead woman, in which the point of his spear is sticking, so with that exclamation of disgust he feels more towards the left.
"Here it is, Jack," as his hand rests against the warm skin of the wild pig. "A fine young fellow, and just heavy enough to be tender. Catch hold of his leg behind there and haul away; he can bleed from the platform, where the ants won't get at him before morning."
They drag the limp carcase up the ladder and lay it out across the planks, after which Collins goes back to his blanket, wiping his wet hands against his trousers, while the Malay boy squats once more to watch beside the pig and keeps himself awake by counting the drops of blood as they drip from the platform spaces with distinct splashes into the pools which they are making on the ground below.