354 NORTHMOST AUSTRALIA 



get away from the coast until he had been forced southward to 

 about 2 miles north of the site of the present town of Cardwell, 

 which by the time of the " Basilisk's " visit, twenty-three years 

 later, had become an agricultural centre and the port for the 

 Etheridge goldfield. 



" Various tribes of aborigines," says Moresby, " range about 

 the vicinity and not unnaturally regard the white men who are 

 rapidly dispossessing them of their homes as mortal enemies. They 

 show this feeling by committing murders and outrages, and suffer 

 terrible retaliation at the hands of our countrymen, who employ 

 native troopers, commanded by white men, to hunt down and 

 destroy the offenders." 



MR. SABBEN, Navigating Lieutenant of the " Basilisk" was 

 left in charge of the " Peri." (SEE MAP K.) The "Basilisk" 

 after leaving Cardwell, took in wood and water at Fitzroy Island, 1 

 off Cape Grafton (SEE MAP G), and left for Cape York on 9th 

 February. SOMERSET was reached on the i6th and the steamer 

 lay there at anchor for six nights. (SEE MAP A.) 



The settlement had been founded in 1866, but had failed to 

 attract a trading population. Captain Moresby found only 

 FRANK JARDINE, the explorer of 1865, now acting as Police Magis- 

 trate, and the five white men of his boat's crew, with some fifteen 

 or twenty coloured men, some of them native troopers and the 

 rest pearl-divers. The removal of the settlement to a better site 

 was already contemplated. 



During the detention of the " Basilisk " at Somerset, an 

 attempt to visit some of the islands in boats, piloted by MR. CHESTER, 

 formerly Police Magistrate at Somerset, was rendered abortive by 

 stormy weather, which set in as soon as the Albany Passage had 

 been cleared. Moresby visited a NATIVE CAMP about 3 miles 

 from the settlement and was impressed by the low type of humanity 

 presented by the idle, depressed and shiftless natives, who, in sharp 

 contrast to those of New Guinea, attempted no cultivation and 

 built no permanent dwellings. 



The " Basilisk " left Somerset on 22nd February, and in a 

 few days located a reported danger, now known as the MORESBY 

 ROCK, east of Saddle Island (10 i' S. ; 142 42' E.). Two vessels 

 had already been wrecked on it. SADDLE ISLAND is described as 

 " fertile and hilly, though uninhabited." 



About 30 miles north of Saddle Island lies GABBA ISLAND, 

 or The Brothers (9 45' S.), and this was visited next. The large 

 reef south of the island, charted as MOURILYAN REEF (after 

 Lieutenant Mourilyan), was surveyed. 



Gabba Island is distinguished by a couple of " twin " hills, 



1 In 1877, the writer was on board the " Normanby," from Singapore, when 250 

 Chinese, bound for the Palmer goldfield, were landed on Fitzroy Island, to be quaran- 

 tined because of cholera on board. 



