The Logbooks of the Lady Nelson - With the journal of her first commander Lieutenant James Grant by Ida Lee
page 52 of 327 (15%)
page 52 of 327 (15%)
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at Sydney.
On 27th March, Murray accompanied by Barrallier and Caley set out to explore the stream. They went up its windings as far as possible passing no less than 42 short reaches. Its breadth at the entrance was about half a cable's length and at the farthest part reached by the boat not more than 18 or 20 feet, the passage being there impeded by trees lying across it. While his party were exploring, the commander with Euranabie made excursions along the shore to the mouth of the harbour. "The beach was covered with shells, many of them beautiful and some of them entirely new to me. I observed another creek not so large as the former which I have described but having its entrance quite filled up...so that the sea could not enter it...the land in general was above the level of the sea and the soil was in some places light and black, in others a red clay. We fell in with a rocky point about which I observed playing in the water a number of fishes called salmon in New Holland. I expressed a desire to the native of having some...and no sooner expressed my wish than I missed my companion from behind me. I halloed...upon which he instantly presented himself from the wood with a small stick in his hand. Asking for my knife he presently sharpened one end to a point and then, stripping himself, he leaped from one point of the rock to another until he met with an opportunity of striking a fish which he did, the stick penetrating right through it. I could not but admire the keenness of his sight and his ability to preserve the steadiness of his position, standing as he did on the rough edge of a sharp rock, the sea washing above his knees, his eyes intent on the fish, very difficult to strike from the smallness of its size, presented to him in a narrow back. Though I pressed him to take the fish several times he constantly refused it but accepted some tobacco." |
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