They appeared to feel great compassion
for me when they understood that I was alone on the creek, and gave
me plenty to eat. After being four days with them, I saw that they
were becoming tired of me, and they made signs that they were going
up the creek and that I had better go downwards; but I pretended
not to understand them. The same day they shifted camp, and I
followed them, and on reaching their camp I shot some crows, which
pleased them so much that they made me a breakwind in the centre of
their camp, and came and sat round me until such time as the crows
were cooked, when they assisted me to eat them. The same day one of
the women, to whom I had given part of a crow, came and gave me a
ball of nardoo, saying that she would give me more only she had
such a sore arm that she was unable to pound. She showed me a sore
on her arm, and the thought struck me that I would boil some water
in the billy and wash her arm with a sponge. During the operation,
the whole tribe sat round and were muttering one to another. Her
husband sat down by her side, and she was crying all the time.
After I had washed it, I touched it with some nitrate of silver,
when she began to yell, and ran off, crying out "Mokow! Mokow!"
(Fire! Fire!).
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