ed their suspicions, and returning with
us, they poured out as much honey as our two tin pots could contain.

I may as well describe the mode of finding the honey the bee-hunters
adopt. On perceiving a bee sucking the juice from flowers, he hurries
to the nearest pool and selects a spot where the banks shelve gradually.
He then lying on his face fills his mouth with water, and patiently
awaits the arrival of the bee: as the insect requires moisture, he knows
that ere long it will come and drink. The moment it approaches him he
blows the water from his mouth over it, thus slightly stunning it.
Before it has recovered, he seizes it and by means of some gum fastens
to its legs a tuft of white down, which he has obtained from the
neighbouring trees. The insect flies in a straight line towards its
nest, while the white down serving to impede the progress, enables the
hunter to keep it in view, till it reaches its home.

We ate the honey with a small supply of biscuit, and found it far more
satisfactory food than the tough parrots had proved.

Having taken a last drink and filled up our waterbottles, we parted on
friendly terms with the natives; when, saddling our horses, we continued
our journey.

"There is little chance of our reaching another river with more water in
it than the last, to camp by," observed my brother; "I see none marked
down on the maps for leagues ahead."

We passed through the same sort of scenery as before, with the same
dreary views on either side, so that we might have fancied that we had
already crossed the country a dozen times.

We at length came to the bed of a stream, no longer however containing
water, though I doubt not that we should have obtained it by digging
beneath the surface.

The appearance of the bee-hunters had warned us that there were natives
about, and we had been cautioned against trusting them. We heard that
they had at different times murdered a number of unfortunate hut-keepers
and shepherds up the country, so that we were inclined to form very
unfavourable opinions of the aborigines. Toby, to be sure, was faithful
enough, but then he was semi-civilised. We now asked him if he thought
that there were many natives in the neighbourhood to whom the
bee-hunters belonged.

He shook his head--"May be!" he said; "bad mans, keep out of him way."

This advice we were ready enough to adopt, and we had no fear, should we
meet them on the open ground, of keeping them at bay