162 A HISTORY OF THE COLONY OF VICTORIA 



Rev. Mr. Naylor, Mr. C. 0. Parsons, Mr. Cotter, young Gellibrand, 

 two volunteer friends, four experienced bushmen, and two intelligent 

 natives. On the very day of their arrival in Geelong, a native had 

 come in from the westward reporting the murder of two white men 

 by the Karakoi tribe, whose hunting grounds lay around Lake Colac. 

 The natives of the Barrabool tribe, who had conceived a great regard 

 for Gellibrand, were eager to revenge his death, and a large number 

 of them, in battle array, attached themselves to the expedition. As 

 they neared the borders of the lake they suddenly came upon tracks 

 of horses, which were easily identifiable as those of the missing men. 

 They were followed for a long distance, and led to the spot which 

 had been described by the native as the scene of the murder. But 

 the Karakoi natives were in hiding in the long reeds which margined 

 the lake and could not be found. The friendly blacks, however, suc- 

 ceeded in capturing one man, who, under threats of instant death, 

 confessed that he was present at the murder, and that the bodies 

 of the two white men had been stripped and thrown into the lake, 

 but that the horses had escaped though wounded with spears. The 

 confession did not avert the fate of the captive, for he had scarcely 

 finished when he fell with half a dozen spears in his body. The 

 Barrabool tribe having satisfied their vengeance at once returned 

 to their own district, and the white contingent of the expedition, 

 finding themselves surrounded by large numbers of hostile natives 

 in ambush, were unwilling to risk further loss of life, now that they 

 had ascertained definitely the fate of their friends. So they returned 

 to Geelong without having seen the bodies or recovered any of the 

 effects of the lost travellers. A public offer of a reward of 300 for 

 accurate information as to the fate of Gellibrand failed to educe any 

 fresh facts, and for over three years the company in which his life 

 was insured for 11,000 refused to pay the policy, on the ground 

 that he might still be alive. Circumstantial as were the statements 

 made by the blacks, and apparently purposeless if untrue, they were 

 by no means universally credited. Equally circumstantial accounts 

 were received from other natives of two white men on foot in the 

 last stages of exhaustion having tottered into their camp one evening, 

 and though fed on fish and tended with care having died in a day 

 or two. More than one skeleton found in the neighbourhood of the 



