NATIVE HUNTING METHODS 133 



the surface, but ever and anon considerable flotsam 

 indicated vital gaps. In spite of splashing and * shoo- 

 ing/ and the complications of the weir, we had had 

 the mortification of seeing hosts escape. 



Then George changed his tactics. Abandoning his 

 faith in the weir, he converted it into what he called, 

 in his enthusiastic excitement, * a bed.' He laid 

 branches on the weir so that the leaves and twigs 

 interlaced and crossed, buttressing the structure with 

 another row of palisades. His theory was that the 

 fish, as the water became shallower, would cease their, 

 efforts to wriggle through, and, leaping high, would 

 land on the bed and be easily captured. No preliminary 

 shouting and splashing affected the solidity of that 

 determined array. Mullet know all about blackfellows' 

 weirs and their beds. Some slid through. Many 

 leaped, and, curving gracefully in the air, struck the 

 ' bed ' at such an angle that it offered no more resistance 

 to them than a sheet of damp tissue-paper. They 

 sniggered as they went through it, and splashed wildly 

 to the sea. They were grand fish undaunted, afraid 

 of no man or his paltry obstacles to liberty, up to 

 every cunning manoeuvre. 



Were we to be beaten by a lot of silly, slippery 

 fish in a shallow stream? Never ! January's un- 

 sheltered sun played upon my tanned, wet, and shame- 

 less back ; the salt sweat coursed down my shoulders 

 and dripped from my face. The scrub fowl babbled 

 and chuckled, cockatoos jeered from the topmost 

 branches of giant milkwood trees and nodded with 

 yellow crests grave approval of the deeds of the 

 besieged ; fleet white pigeons flew from a banquet 



blue fruits to a diet of crude seeds, and not a single 



