102 NOTES OF TRAVEL 
Rodd’s Bay for the head station, and camped that night 
with Livingstone, who had removed kis sheep from 
Teningering on the Burnett. I gave him leave to shear 
them on my run, and thus had hin: as a neighbour for several 
weeks. He had a poor lot of men with him, and when they 
lost sheep, as they not unfrequently did, it was always 
attributed to the blacks, of whom I had seen scarcely any. 
The men seemed to suffer from what is sometimes called 
“blue funk,” and the climax was reached not long after 
I had got my own men out. One evening we heard 
some firing of guns and wondered whatever it all meant ; 
but we took matters calmly, never dreaming of danger. 
Next morning a tell-tale man let us into the secret. One 
lot of sheep which were camped some distance from the rest 
would not settle down for the mght as usual, so all hands. 
went over from the main camp taking their rifles and their 
fears with them, and they probably contributed to the con- 
fusion. After a time there was a cry, “ the blacks are sneak- 
ing on us!” There were the firesticks they carried, moving 
hither and thither, in a small scrubby gully, so bang, bang, 
went rifles and revolvers; otherwise there was no noise, 
nor was an attack made by the niggers, and the sheep were 
driven with haste to the main camp. After all, it turned out 
that the alarm was caused by fireflies, of which there were 
plenty about the banks of the watercourses ! 
Joseph Wilson, who has just completed a new house 
at Gin Gin, came on to me, and erected my house, and out- 
houses. His wife did the cooking, and such other domestic work 
work as was needed—first of all while my homestead consisted 
of a couple of bark humpies, and later on, when the more 
pretentious buildings were sufficiently advanced to be occupied. 
Few people have been blessed with a more excellent couple 
than Joe Wilson and his wife. Wilson was a good carpenter 
and builder, and needed no watching ; he was a thoroughly 
reliable man. Mrs. Wilson had a special horror of dirt, 
and a bark humpy, with an earthen floor, was a model of 
cleanliness while under her direction. She made yeast for 
her own use, and her bread was the pride of the district, 
while nobody who ate the food she cooked was ever known 
to suffer from indigestion ! Between Ipswich and Gladstone 
T passed only two hotels, that between the Norths and Mount 
