Missing Friends
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On one evening that is for ever engraven on my memory, we were lying in our tent—Thorkill and I. It had been raining heavily all day, and we had not been able to be about. We felt pretty miserable, our usual stock of conversation seemed to be exhausted, but far out in the evening it revived again, so much indeed that Thorkill began to tell me of things of which he had never spoken before. He told me of his parents, of his brother and his sister, and explained to me where their farm in Iceland was, giving me the address, describing the road leading to it, and every detail, until I said to him that if we were lucky enough now to get a bit of gold we would both go home to Iceland and settle down there. From that conversation drifted to other things, and was at last almost at a standstill, when he called me by name, and, in a bashful sort of way, observed, "I say, were you ever in love?"
This was a theme on which we had never enlarged: partly because there had not been much opportunity yet for either of us in Queensland to indulge in such a luxury, and partly because I do not know, to the best of my recollection, that it had ever been mentioned between us, so, as I recognized that he wanted to tell me something, I said, a little surprised, "Why do you ask?"
"I have," said he. "While I was overseer on that farm in Alo, I knew a girl. Oh, how good she was, and how beautiful! I sometimes would go and visit her in the evening. She was only a servant girl, and her father was working there too. One evening I kissed her."
"I am afraid," said I, "you have not forgotten her yet."
"No; her I can never forget."
"Why did you not marry her?" said I. "I suppose as you went visiting her, she would have had no objection?"
"How could I?" replied he. "If only I had been an ordinary working man I would willingly have asked her; but I was not that. Her father always spoke to me as if I owned a mansion, and yet I had scarcely sufficient salary to pay for my own clothes. No, I never asked her."
"Does she know you are out here?" inquired I.
"No, neither she nor my parents, nor anybody; they must think I am dead."
I had nothing to say. I was lying thinking about matters of my own. A little after this I thought I heard him crying. Was it possible? I did not like the idea. I listened again. Yes! there was no mistake. Thorkill was really crying. Deep, big, stifled sobs. I asked what was the matter. Two or three times I asked before he answered. At last he said, "I could not help it; I cried because I know very well I shall never see Reikjavik" (the only town in Iceland) "again."
After that I kept talking for some time to him in a sort of overbearing way about that, saying we need not cry, surely, about that, if that was our only trouble; that we had money enough to get home now, and if we had not, what then? As for myself, if I set my mind on going home, rather than cry over it I would stow away on a ship or work my passage. But I got no answer from Thorkill. I could not sleep, and soon after the day broke. The rain had by this time ceased, and as I saw that Thorkill had now fallen asleep, I thought it a pity to waken him, and crept as quietly as I could out of the tent to make a fire and get a drop of tea for breakfast. As I sat by the fire an hour after, eating my breakfast, I saw Thorkill coming, creeping on his hands and feet out of the tent, with his head screwed round, looking up in the air over the tent. I somehow thought he was looking at a bird, and wondered he had not got the gun, so I sat still and said nothing, but kept watching him. When he was a long way out of the tent he got up, and, still looking up in the air, pointed fixedly at something and cried, "See! oh, look there!" I stole behind him and looked, but could see nothing, so I asked, "What is it?"
"Oh, don't you see? See! a large Russian emigrant ship flying through the air."
"Are you going altogether insane?" cried I, beating him on the back. The next moment with a deep groan he fell right into my arms. I asked him what was the matter. Was he sick? Was he bitten by a snake? I do not know half I asked him, but all the reply I got as I laid him in his bunk again, was, "Go for a minister."
My mate was dying, and I knew it now. Dear reader, whoever you may be, if you have seen your nearest friend die, then you know how bitter it is. But if you at such time have been among others who have shared your grief, and had a doctor to take the responsibility off your hands, then you may only guess at what I felt when I saw Thorkill lying there perfectly unconscious. We had as it were for a long time been everything to each other, and the disappointments and mishaps we both, so far, had suffered in Queensland, had, it seemed at that moment, made him simply indispensable to my existence. How could I go for a parson? I jumped out of the tent and ran round it three or four times before I recollected that I did not know of any human habitation within fifty miles! Then I went in again and spoke to him. There was no answer; not a movement in his body. He lay as if in a heavy sleep, a high colour in his face. One of his arms was hanging out over the bunk, and would not rest where I put it, so I took a saddle and placed that underneath it, and as it was not yet high enough, I put a pint pot on that again. There I balanced it, and there it remained. I had not much medicine, only some quinine. That was no good. Then I thought he must have been taken by an apoplectic fit. I took the scissors and cut off all his hair and beard. Then I went outside and worked desperately at making a sunshade over the tent, because the sun was beating down on us so fiercely; next in again, and out. I did not know what to do. I could not for a moment remain still. Sometimes I carried water from the creek and bathed his head with it. Then I feared I was only tormenting him, and knocked it off again. As I sat looking at him in the afternoon I could not avoid thinking about how he had in his last hour of good health made such a complete confession about matters he always before had been so reticent about. Why? I ask the question now. Can any one answer it. It is not fashionable in our age to believe more than can be rationally explained, but I believe most people in their lives have had similar strange experiences. If I make the remark that I am superstitious, then I know I shall lay myself open to ridicule, and yet it is only a form of admitting that I do not know all that passes in heaven and on earth.
In the afternoon, as Thorkill still lay in the same immovable trance, I thought I must find out whether he was conscious of my being there or not, so I knelt down and spoke in his ear, and called him by name. "Thorkill," cried I, "if you can hear me and know that I am here, try to give me some sign." Then as I watched him I thought he breathed extra deep, but I was never certain. Anyhow, although I had myself no Bible, and never had used one before, I got his out of his swag and began reading at the commencement and kept on until it was too dark to read any more. During the night the rain and storm began again. I could hear in Thorkill's altered breathing that the end was near, but I had no other light but a match I struck occasionally, and it seemed to frighten me when I struck one and saw his altered face. At last I knew he was dead, and in an agony of sorrow and excitement I began praying to Balder, our ancient god of all that was noble and good, to come and fetch his own. I was fearfully agitated, and remember well how I walked outside the tent singing the old "Bjarkamsal," and almost fancying I saw all the ancient gods coming through the air. It is a common saying of a person who has died, that he was too good to live, but if ever that saying was true of any one, it was true of Thorkill. A pure descendant from the ancient Vikings, yet how different was he from his forefathers. And all Icelanders are more or less the same. Honest, frank, and kind, he could not understand why everybody else was not also honest and good, and I know very well he declined the contest of life; he could not match his simple faith with the cunning and brutality of the ordinary set of people one meets with when the pocket is empty. Better, perhaps, he should have died then and there. Why was I sorry? Why did I not rejoice? Who knew but that I some day might not die in great deal more lonely and in much more friendless way than he? He had lost nothing, and it was I who was the loser; but for his sake I would be glad. In this strain of mind I passed the remainder of the night, but when at last daylight came it brought with it the grim reality of death such as it is, and life such as it is, and also a sense of what was now the only favour I could show the remains of my friend. It was three or four o'clock that afternoon before I had managed, as decently as I could, to bury the body, and then all my energy was expended. Yet as I sat resting myself for a moment, I was aware that I must be off somewhere before evening, far from that spot. I had a splitting headache; my legs seemed unable to carry me. Yet I must be off to get the horses. I found them, but when I came home with them it was evening and I had to let them go again. I could do no more, and not altogether with an uncomfortable feeling was it that I that evening laid myself down in Thorkill's bunk, thinking that perhaps after all we need not part. I was sick now myself, and fancied I saw fearful visions all night. The next morning I could scarcely raise myself to a sitting posture, but during the day I managed with the instinct of self-preservation to carry some water up from the creek and to bake a damper. My recollections for some time after this are very indistinct. It may have been a week or it may have been two weeks. All that I remember of that time are glimpses of myself sitting by Thorkill's grave, singing, or playing the flute. The first clear recollection of that time which I have, was one afternoon when I was lying in the bunk watching, in a lazy sort of way, some rats nibbling at the flour-bag, which had somehow fallen down from its place. The flour lay scattered about the tent, and everything seemed in glorious disorder. I lay a long time looking at the rats, and wondering where Thorkill was—whether he was making breakfast, for I felt very hungry. I had no remembrance whatever of his being dead. I called him; my voice seemed curious and weak. I grabbed a poker to strike at the rats with it—how heavy it felt! Then I got up and went outside, and stood staring for a long time at the grave before I recollected that he was dead, and that I myself was or had been sick. Everything outside the tent bore evidence of having been thrown about as if by a maniac, and I felt a thrill of horror running through me as I thought of myself, how perhaps I had walked about here at night alone, sick and delirious. I felt quite myself, however, although very weak. I was hungry, and felt that I must have something to eat, get it where I could. I staggered about looking for food. Not a vestige of tea could I find; there was no meat except a few nasty bones which I found in the billy, and had to throw away; then I discovered a little sugar, and I scraped together some flour. My next trouble was that I had no fire and no dry matches. It took me all my time to get a fire, by rubbing a hard and soft stick together, but at last I succeeded, and then made a johnny-cake in the fire. Out of sugar I made my supper, and sat by the fire dreaming and living it all over again. With the help of my gun I got some birds the next day, and stewed them in the billy with flour and figweed. I also found the horses all right, but I was too weak to think of shifting my quarters just then, much as I would have liked to do so, because there seemed to me to be a sort of haunted air about the whole place. I busied myself all day, when I was not hunting for food, with repairing my clothes, but I had a great longing to see somebody of my own species again, and to sit there every day talking to or thinking about a dead man had something sickly in it that I did not like. I could not for a couple of days find either my money or the bit of gold we had got. Whatever I had done with it was to me a complete blank. I found it all at last in this way: that somehow my hat did not seem to fit me, and when I looked it over, there was all the money stuck under the lining, but I never had any recollection of putting it there.
I read all Thorkill's letters and took them with me when I left. They were from his parents and his sister, addressed to him while he was in Denmark, telling him of all sorts of small home-news, and hoping soon to see him again. These he had been carrying with him everywhere, and I had often seen him reading them. There were also photographs of all his family, and I made them all up into a small parcel intending some day soon to write to his people.
I confess I never did write. I could not bring myself to do it. I thought of what he had said—that they must think him dead. Why, then, reopen their wound? Let him remain "a missing friend." As I had no settled abode for a long time after this, I carried his papers with me everywhere for many years. One photograph, of his sister, a very handsome girl, I had until after I was married, and treasured it greatly. I think Mrs. – must know what became of it at last.
CHAPTER IX.
GOING TO THE PALMER
When I left Thorkill's grave I made a course as near as I could for the Cape gold-field. This place I found almost deserted, as most of the diggers had left for the Palmer. The few people who remained there had seemingly nothing else to speak about but the fabulous richness of that field, and they were all deploring each his untoward circumstances which kept him from going thither. And so it came to pass that, while gradually recovering my spirits, I made up my mind to go to the Palmer too. But to go to the Palmer was at that time easier said than done. The Palmer gold-fields lay somewhere in a totally unexplored country, and none had been known to reach the Palmer from the Cape after the commencement of the wet season. Many unsuccessful attempts had been made, and the returned parties spoke loudly of the "impossibilities" on the road, such as swollen rivers, swamps, marshes, mountains, blacks, and what not besides; and what seemed to me the worst, no supplies of any kind were to be found on the fields. One had simply to carry with him rations sufficient to last until he returned. Add to this that a pint pot full of flour cost half-a-crown on the Cape, with other things at a proportionate rate, and it made me decide another way.
A new port had been opened on the coast by the shipping companies as the most feasible spot from which to reach the Palmer. The name of this place was Cooktown on the Endeavour River; and the spot is identical with a place mentioned in Captain Cook's travels, where he ran his ship, the Endeavour, ashore to carry out some necessary repairs to that vessel. To get to Cooktown from the Cape I should first have to go to Townsville and thence take ship to Cooktown. Although the distance from the Cape to Townsville was as great as from the Cape to the Palmer, yet, as it was possible to travel the one road and not the other, I decided to go there, and from that port take ship to Cooktown, whence after having obtained supplies, I would try to reach the Palmer.
I will not tire the reader by describing my journey to Townsville. My horses were well rested and in good mettle, and I let them trot out every day, so that I reached the coast very quickly. I found Townsville crowded with people who wanted to go to the Palmer. The steamers could not take them fast enough, and in trying to secure a passage for myself and my horses I was disappointed time after time. Money, however, was flying about all over the place. I was offered work in several quarters—in fact I was nearly implored to take it up for fifteen shillings a day, or there was piecework, by which I could easily have earned double that amount, but, of course, I could not think of it. At last I obtained a passage in a schooner which had been fitted up for the voyage. There was accommodation below decks for forty horses, and fully that number were hoisted on board. On the deck was accommodation for as many passengers as could find standing room, and I think there must have been over a hundred people altogether. Indeed, we were so crowded that, if the skipper had a right to complain of anything, it certainly could not be that he had not a full cargo. I paid five pounds apiece for the passage of the horses and two pounds ten shillings for myself. We had to find our own forage, too, for the horses, and also to provide our own food. Water, however, the skipper had to find himself—no light matter on so small a ship. We were supposed to make the run in forty-eight hours, and carried water enough for double that time. I had corn and hay to last my horses for a fortnight, but some of the others had scarcely any fodder. At last we started, and when the little steamer which hauled us out of the creek had cast us off, it was proved to my entire satisfaction that my run of bad luck was not yet at an end. A strong wind was blowing, but although the ship was tearing through the water at a terrible rate, yet we did not make real way, as the wind was straight against us. It may seem strange that we should start with such an adverse wind, but once the horses were on board the skipper had to go. The first evening we were out the captain and mate fought and nearly knocked each other into the sea. I mention this, however, only because I remember it; I don't think our troublesome journey was due to neglect or bad seamanship, but the wind was against us, and kept so day after day until at last it blew a perfect hurricane. The horses, of course, suffered very much. At one time they would stand nearly on their heads, at another, the other way, now on one side, then on the other, as the ship was jerking up and down. I was working down below with my two horses all the time, trying to ease them all I could. I tied my tent, clothes and blankets round about the stalls to lessen the force of the knocks a little for them. All the horses, however, did not fare so well as that, for their masters themselves were, for the most part, lying in a helpless condition up on deck, and the air below was so foul that it took a good pair of lungs to endure it. The horses soon began to die off, too; and to haul the poor dead brutes up and throw them overboard took us all our time, seeing that very few of us were capable of such work. Upon deck it was indeed a sight. Some were completely gone with sea-sickness and had tied themselves to the bulwarks, others were lying "yarning" and laughing as if nothing were the matter. Many of these men must have known that even if the ship could weather the storm, yet with the death of their horses all hope of a successful journey was at an end for them. Yet one heard no complaint; and I should like here to pay this compliment to Britishers: that, whether English, Scotch, or Irish, they are, as a rule, brave men. Ours was not a momentary suffering either. It was a constant drenching with the waves, day after day. The horses, our most valuable property, hauled overboard as fast sometimes as we could get them up, and our own lives in constant danger! Yet no one complained. They would "yarn," laugh, or crack jokes all day long. The only exceptions to this rule, I am sorry to say, although I hope they were not typical, were two Danes who had come on board. One of them had informed me as soon as we left Townsville that he intended to run away from his wife who lived there. Now, when the storm was blowing, he became intensely religious and declared it to be a punishment from Heaven for his wickedness and he made me most sacred promises, one after the other, that he would return to her bosom if only God would spare him this time. The other declared the ship to be a regular pirate craft and Queensland an accursed country. I had to cook for them both, hand them their food, and cheer up their spirits all the way. One day we spied a large steamer flying the flag of distress. She came from the south too, and was, like ourselves, trying to reach Cooktown. As she came labouring through the waves we saw that it was the Lord Ashley. The deck was black with people and I do not know how many hundred horses. This heavy deck-cargo caused the ship to rock so that it looked as if it were about capsizing every time it lurched over. Two of her masts were already overboard, and as our schooner ran past her we saw the people engaged in throwing the horses overboard alive. Nearly all the horses were sacrificed in this manner. To see the poor brutes try to swim after the steamer or the schooner was heartrending. We on the schooner could give no assistance; indeed, after all, the steamer was better off than ourselves, insomuch that it kept on its way while the schooner had to tear up and down and to do its best not to be blown south again. When we at last reached Cooktown, some days after, the Lord Ashley was lying there; but it was her last journey. She was so knocked about that, to the best of my belief, she was sold as lumber afterwards. All our water was now used up, and we had either to try to effect a landing or go south again. As the mate declared he knew a place on the coast just where we were, where there was a fresh-water creek, it was decided to call for volunteers among the passengers to man the boat and get some water. As I had two horses on board and was not sea-sick, I declared myself ready to make one. There were six oars to be manned. The other five volunteers, although passengers, were yet old sailors. The mate was to take the helm. Before the boat was lowered great care was taken to lash the empty casks in their proper position and to have everything in order. Then the captain took the wheel and ran the schooner in towards the land further than customary when we tacked. As we turned the boat was lowered. The men and I jumped down. Off flew the ship: it seemed miles before I realized that it was gone. And we in the boat—talk about the big swing at home in Tivoli; that was only child's play to the rocking we now had! My hat blew off and flew towards Townsville; my hair, and even my shirt, were trying hard to follow! One could scarcely get the oars in the water. But, in spite of all, we paddled as best we could, and shortly after were inside a little harbour, where the water was comparatively smooth and where we effected a landing. How peaceful and quiet it all seemed here under the mountain. I felt, as I trod the firm soil under my feet, that I should never make a good sailor, and it was a terror to me how we were ever to reach the schooner again. We rolled the casks up to the little creek and filled them. The mate said he had been there some years before when he was with a New Guinea expedition. As we were roaming about, waiting for the right moment to get out again, we found a lot of wreckage, old rotten spars, a cabin door, &c. Then we came on the skeleton of a man, not all together, but scattered about. There were also remains of some old clothes, and we found a purse with silver in it, something less than a pound. The mate declared this money to be an infallible charm, and suggested that we should each take a piece and say nothing about it. There were only six pieces of money, and we were seven to share it. No one would stand out for any consideration, so we drew lots. I secured a two-shilling piece, and, whether for good or for bad luck, I have it yet, and used to carry it for years in the most approved fashion round my neck. We had no tools with us, so we could not bury the bones. There they lie, perhaps even yet, the remains of another "missing friend." We came on board the schooner again somehow. Opinions differed much amongst us as to why we had not been drowned, and no verdict was arrived at. The mate said it was the charms we carried which had done it, others said that God held His hand over us, but the one who had no charm said it was because we were the very refuse of the devil. I express no opinion myself, only that it was certainly surprising. As the storm gradually veered round a little we reached Cooktown. Out of the forty horses only sixteen were alive; one of mine was dead, and the other did not look as if it could live long after I got it out of the ship, yet it gradually came round and proved a very good horse afterwards.
Cooktown is now reckoned among the old-established towns of Queensland, but when I landed there it looked wild enough. To describe it I ask the reader to think of a fair in the Old Country, leaving out the monkeys and merry-go-rounds. There were some thousands of people all camped out in tents. Those who intended to start business in Cooktown had pegged out plots of ground in the main street and run up large tents or corrugated iron structures in which all sorts of merchandise was sold cheap enough. But the wet season kept on, and there was no communication with the Palmer. People left town to go there every day in the rain and slush, but many returned saying it was no use trying, as the rivers could not be crossed. There was at that time a very mixed lot of people in Cooktown. All the loafers, pickpockets, and card-sharpers seemed to have trooped in from Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne, looking for the gold in other people's pockets, and the robbing of tents was an everyday occurrence. Then, although it had been made known far and wide that any one who wanted to go to the Palmer must either starve or carry six months' rations with him, still many destitute and good-for-nothing people could also be seen wherever one looked: these form a class of men as easily distinguished from the bona fide miners as if they belonged altogether to another species. No work of any kind was going on for more than one-tenth of the people who looked for employment, and any one who wanted a man might easily get him for his "tucker." I believe one could have got them to work all day for their dinner alone. Men would walk about among the tents in droves, and wherever they saw rations there they would beg. While this was the true state of affairs in Cooktown just then, I remember well standing outside the newspaper office, reading the paper, the leading article in which described in glowing terms the bustle and activity going on in this rising city, and declared that any man who could lift a hammer was welcome to a pound sterling a day! Of course I did not look for any work, so I did not care. There was also a great deal of sickness, especially dysentery, and the doctors required cash down before they would even look at any one. If one took a stroll up among the tents, it was a common, indeed an inevitable, sight to see men lying helpless, writhing with pain on the ground, some of them bellowing out for pity or mercy. Very little pity or help, as a rule, did they get. Men would pass such a poor object with the greatest apathy, or at most go up to him and give good advice, such as that he ought to be ashamed of lying there and ought to try and crawl into the tent again! Such was life in Cooktown during the first "rush" there to any Queensland gold-fields.