...so all fresh meat has to be wallaby, euro or emu.
Early the next morning I went out again a bit further leaving the artist painting and Larnach waiting for the natives to bring in his animals. This time I had better luck and managed to get a couple of flying shots at wallabies which both came off. One of them had a joey in the pouch. It went into pickle after being drawn by Murch. I spent the rest of the day swimming in the hole and making damper and wallaby tail stew with onions and raisons, dried fruit and biscuits. Very rich and very good.
The natives brought in many lizards and churingas of wood during the day and we took some photos of the family life. Larnach and Murch did a good trade in churingas of stone, a slate like stone, a skull and some digging sticks. All day groups of the local natives went off on hunting parties, yam digging etc. I found it almost impossible to make an accurate estimate of their total numbers.
In the evening I left Murch to stir the stew of wallaby tails and went with a party of about thirty women and children and watched them digging yams on a sandy patch south west of the creek. I bought a few back to to add to the stew. The onions, raisins, dried fruit and broken biscuits seemed to take an inordinate amount of time to soften the meat. In the end we dined rather late but found the result very good. Hezekiel however was not impressed and had a wallaby all to himself. As far as I could see he ate it half raw. He had scoffed the lot by morning.
Friday (27th Jan)
Today, I again had an unsuccessful journey after wallabies as too many natives were about. So far the natives have not shot or killed any meat at all but there was a stir among them this evening as Titus brought in a couple of emus for them. He had a gun of which he was very proud.
Saturday (28th Jan)
Today I went out in another direction (to the south) after (continues...)
