es like a Welsh sheepdog.
He was by no means afraid, and before long became friendly and returned
with me to their camp.

The tribe had left behind them a number of treasures--bundles of
firemaking sticks, bean-and-gum ornaments, and the usual bark
"portmanteaus" [Note at end of paragraph.] containing hair-string,
feathers, red ochre, and other knick-knacks. Amongst their weapons was a
curiously shaped boomerang; on one of the woommeras was a rough carving of
either a spider or crab. As soon as the camels arrived we unloaded and set
to work on the well, "soak-sucking" in our old style. By morning we had
watered the camels and horses. The former were of course pretty fit,
but the poor ponies had done a fair stage, especially so since they had
had no feed except the rank dry tops of the spinifex. May 3rd sunrise,
to May 8th sunrise, they had travelled on what water we could afford them
from our own supply, viz., three gallons apiece nightly, and six gallons
the first night. The grass around the well, though dry, was of great
benefit to them. For the camels we had to cut down the mulga trees, the
branches of which grew too high from the ground to permit them to browse
off the leaves. A number of dingoes serenaded us as we worked at night;
what they live upon is not quite clear, unless it be spinifex rats. There
were other small rats in the locality, two of which the dwarf had for
supper--plucked, warmed upon the ashes, torn in pieces by his long nails
and eaten; an unpleasant meal to witness, and the partaker of it badly
needed a finger-bowl, for his hands and beard were smeared with blood.
He did not take kindly to salt beef, for his teeth were not fit for hard
work, as he pointed out to us; and salt beef is not by any means easy to
masticate. As a rule the blacks have such splendid teeth that the dwarf's
case is remarkable, seeing that he was not at all an old man.

[* Note: A native bark "portmanteau," brought back from this locality,
was opened at Newstead Abbey and found to contain--

1. Plumes of hawks' and crows' feathers.
2. Neck-bands of opossum wool.
3. String bracelets.
4. Fragments of quartz, suitable for spear and chisel heads.
5. Fragments of sandstone, for making red paint.
6. Message-stick.
7. A stick 12 inches long, wrapped in downy feathers and greasy string;
on this was wound a great length of human-hair string, forming a
bobbin-shaped article, the use of which I do not know. I have now thre