of youth; and they settled down to live as
comfortably as possible among the blacks until some fortuitous occurrence
should enable us all to leave these weird and remote regions. The girls
were in constant terror of being left alone--of being stolen, in fact.
They had been told how the natives got wives by stealing them; and they
would wake up in the dead of the night screaming in the most
heart-rending manner, with a vague, nameless terror. Knowing that the
ordinary food must be repulsive to my new and delightful companions, I
went back to a certain island, where, during my journey from the little
sand-spit to the main, I had hidden a quantity of corn beneath a cairn.

This corn I now brought back to my Gulf home, and planted for the use of
the girls. They always ate the corn green in the cob, with a kind of
vegetable "milk" that exudes from one of the palm-trees. When they
became a little more reconciled to their new surroundings, they took a
great interest in their home, and would watch me for hours as I tried to
fashion rude tables and chairs and other articles of furniture. Yamba
acted as cook and waitress, but after a time the work was more than she
could cope with unaided. You see, she had to _find_ the food as well as
cook it. The girls, who were, of course, looked upon as my wives by the
tribe (this was their greatest protection), knew nothing about
root-hunting, and therefore they did not attempt to accompany Yamba on
her daily expeditions. I was in something of a dilemma. If I engaged
other native women to help Yamba, they also would be recognised as my
wives. Finally, I decided there was nothing left for me but to acquire
five more helpmates, who were of the greatest assistance to Yamba.

Of course, the constant topic of conversation was our ultimate escape
overland; and to this end we made little expeditions to test the girls'
powers of endurance. I suggested, during one of our conversations, that
we should either make for Port Essington, or else go overland in search
of Port Darwin; but the girls were averse to this, owing to their terror
of the natives.

Little did I dream, however, that at a place called Cossack, on the coast
of the North-West Division of Western Australia, there was a settlement
of pearl-fishers; so that, had I only known it, civilisation--more or
less--was comparatively near. Cossack, it appears, was the pearling
rendezvous on the western side of the continent, much as Som