|
358
GOLD AND GEMS.
|
||
|
|
||
|
stockman
who was looking after a remote part of the run. This man took him
aside, and told him how he thought he could show him something worth
the seeing, and which he was also anxious to have his opinion about.
Going to the back of his hut, he removed a mass of rubbish, and
produced a dirty beef bag. Opening the mouth and diving down, he
brought up about thirty pounds' weight of opal matrix. He had been
riding after his cattle one day when his eye was caught by something in
the grass which flashed in the sun. Long exposure to heat and rain had
caused some of the nodules to split, and exposed the lustrous stone
encased within. Mr. Bond gave the man a cheque for two or three hundred
pounds for the stone and his information, and took up the land
indicated.
Seven Years with Blanket and Billy.—The
news soon spread. He was pegged out all round—that is, other
enterprising gentlemen came up with their pick?, shovels, and blankets,
and followed his example. But luck favoured Mr. Bond : their patches
were -valueless. The value of a gem depends to a large extent on its
rarity, and it would have depreciated the value of the find if similar
discoveries had been made. For seven years Mr. Bond has been
prospecting this patch of country with the utmost care, at a cost of
nearly ,£15,000. Generally alone, he has ridden over the rolling lands
for months together, with all the ardour of the born prospector,
steering his own course through these trackless wilds, heedless of
blacks, boiling his own billy, shooting his own tucker. I have no
space to tell how, with great difficulty, he got a surveyor to ride
thpse 900 weary miles to peg off his claims, how the surveyor, when
half way, wanted a nip of whisky, how Mr. Bond took him 170 miles out
of his way to get it, how they missed it after all, and only found one
bottle of sweet champagne and another of orange bitters at the bush
shanty, and how he has drunk Worcester sauce instead of whisky for
months. "They say we are exterminating the blacks with lire-water,"
said Mr. Bond with a laugh; " by Jove! it's too much trouble to get it
for ourselves, I can assure you, and after paying twenty-five shillings
a bottle for it the nigger does not get much."
•The Country where the Opal is Found.—But
what is this opal country like ? We give a little sketch of it, and
also a short description from the pen of Mr, Robertson, the geologist
who explored the country. " We had for days," he says, " been riding
through a broad belt of rough and disconsolate scrub, breathing an
atmosphere of pulverulent dust, but after crossing the Grey range, we
enter a broad expanse of green and grassy downs. Breathing the ethereal
and invigorating brilliance of the dry air, our spirits rise, and we
strive to forget the rough usage, the forbidding desolation, and the
dust of the past week borne, as we suppose, with exemplary fortitude
and Christian forbearance. The silence is profound. Behind us the
higher eminences of the Grey range rise as out of a cloud of gleaming
vapour, and these, from their appearance are known as the Hay Ricks.
Around us, detached squadrons of emus run in uncertain lines, and
before us, over a sea of verdure, is the mirage of a great lake. We
cross stony ridges, or belts of vitreous and highly transmuted
siliceous rocks, .over which our unshod horses walk warily, and once
again we cross the grassy plain, bearing almost due west. Water is
scarce; sometimes spaces of twenty-five miles separate the water holes
; in some of these a liquid is seen, resembling in colour and
consistency thin white paint, and this decoction is imposed upon
strangers as water. It tastes strongly of ' cow.' . Around us the heat
quivers in the air, and against their mural sides the bright sun dances
with a fierce delight. By dangerous paths we continue to ride up the
slopes of these fantastic-shaped hills, and, by some unaccountable
accident, arrive in safety at the top."
Alone in the Cenre of a Vast Continent.—"
Not a sound (save the panting of our horses) disturbs the solemn and
all-prevailing silence. We are alone with nature in the centre of a
great continent, and we feel that he in'
|
||
|
|
||