depth, for me to get any water. I was fortunate in falling in with a
teamster and his waggon--a typical one of his class; on first sight they
are the most uncouth and foul-tongued men that it is possible to imagine.
But on further acquaintance one finds that the language is as superficial
as the dirt with which they cannot fail to be covered, since they are
always walking in a cloud of dust. My friend on this occasion was
apostrophising his horses with oaths that made my flesh creep, to help
them up a steep hill. The top reached, he petted and soothed his team in
most quaint language. At the bottom of the slope he was a demon of
cruelty, at its summit a kind-hearted human being! I lunched with him,
sitting under his waggon for shade, and found him most entertaining--nor
was the old pony neglected, for he was given a fine feed of chaff and
oats.

In due time I reached Coolgardie, where Lord Douglas and our new partner,
Mr. Driffield (since drowned in a boating accident on the Swan River),
joined me. They had engaged the services of one Luck and his camels, and
had ridden up from the Cross. The rush to Kurnalpi had just broken out,
so Driffield, Luck, and I joined the crowd of fortune-hunters; and a
queer-looking crowd they were too, for every third or fourth swagman
carried on his shoulder a small portable condenser, the boiler hanging
behind him and the cooler in front; every party, whether with horses,
carts, or camels, carried condensers of one shape or another; for the
month was January, no surface water existed on the track, and only salt
water could be obtained, by digging in the salt lakes which the road
passed. The nearest water to the scene of the rush was a salt lake seven
miles distant, and this at night presented a strange appearance.
Condensers of every size and capacity fringed the two shores of a narrow
channel; under each was a fire, and round each all night long could be
seen figures, stoking the burning wood or drawing water, and in the