STATE OF PROVISIONS.

We would gladly have fired into the flights of wild fowl that winged
their way over us, for we, about this time, began to feel the
consequences of the disaster that befell us in the Morumbidgee. The
fresh water having got mixed with the brine in the meat casks, the
greater part of our salt provisions had got spoiled, so that we were
obliged to be extremely economical in the expenditure of what remained,
as we knew not to what straits we might be driven. It will naturally be
asked why we did not procure fish? The answer is easy. The men had
caught many in the Morumbidgee, and on our first navigation of the
Murray, but whether it was that they had disagreed with them, or that
their appetites were palled, or that they were too fatigued after the
labour of the day to set the lines, they did not appear to care about
them. The only fish we could take was the common cod or perch; and,
without sauce or butter, it is insipid enough. We occasionally
exchanged pieces of iron-hoop for two other kinds of fish, the one a
bream, the other a barbel, with the natives, and the eagerness with
which they met our advances to barter, is a strong proof of their
natural disposition towards this first step in civilization.

DEXTERITY OF NATIVES IN FISHING.

As they threw off all reserve when accompanying us as ambassadors, we
had frequent opportunities of observing their habits. The facility, for
instance, with which they procured fish was really surprising. They
would slip, feet foremost, into the water as they walked along the bank
of the river, as if they had accidentally done so, but, in reality, to
avoid the splash they would necessarily have made if they had plunged
in head foremost. As surely as they then disappeared under the surface
of the water, so surely would they re-appear with a fish writhing upon
the point of their short spears. The very otter scarcely exceeds them
in power over the finny race, and so true is the aim of these savages,
even under water, that all the fish we procured from them were pierced
either close behind the lateral fin, or in the very centre of the head,
It is certain, from their indifference to them, that the natives seldom
eat fish when they can get anything else. Indeed, they seemed more
anxious to take the small turtle, which, sunning themselves on the
trunks or logs of trees over the water, were, nevertheless, extremely
on their guard. A gentle splash alone indicated to us that