and myself. Where all were anxious and willing to aid in the good task, it
would have been invidious to select, and the volunteers drew lots from a
bag in which all were blanks but three, the gainers of these lucky numbers
becoming members of the party.

One other addition we had, and right yeoman's service she did, for it was a
'she', reader as the sequel will prove. About eighteen months before, the
troopers had visited Hinchinbrook Island, to recover stolen property, and
in one of the native camps had found an exceedingly pretty gin of some
fourteen summers. The personal charms of this coy nymph of the forest had
proved too much for the susceptible heart of Ferdinand, who, regarding her
as his lawful prize, had borne her, irate and struggling, to the boat, from
whence she was in due course transported to the police camp (mounted on the
pommel of the saddle in front of the adventurous swain), where, in a very
short time she became perfectly at home, and under the name of Lizzie, made
Ferdinand a remarkably pleasant wife.

Certainly the blacks are a curious race, the like of which was never before
seen under the sun. For two days after Lizzie's arrival in camp, she
refused to speak or eat; for the next two days she ate everything she could
lay her hands on, but still kept an unbroken silence; and for another two
days, whenever she was not eating, she "yabbered" so much and so fast that
the other gins looked on aghast, unable to get a word in edgewise, so
continuous was the flow of Hinchinbrook vituperation. On the seventh day,
as if by magic, she brought her tirade to a close, went down to the creek
with the other gins to fetch water, cooked her husband's supper, appeared
perfectly reconciled to her change of life, and henceforth, from her
sharpness, the aptitude with which she picked up the broken English in
which the officers communicate with the troopers, and her great knowledge
of the surrounding country, she became a most useful acquisition to the