At dawn the anchor was hoisted and the journey continued, namely through Weymouth Bay, until Cap Weymouth and Restoration island came into view.

This was the scene of a bloody drama a few weeks ago. An enterprising fisherman had settled here with 30 companies and did business between the surrounding reefs. Suddenly in one night the whole colony was attacked by wild natives and slaughtered to the last man. Many Australian settlers living apart are imperilled by such raids, namely in Queensland, but the savages are just do retribution for the ruthless and often cruel way in which they are displaced from their own land and even exterminated. Thus it is said that at the start of Australia’s colonization by the English natives were killed off by placing bread laced with arsenic as bait near their settlements. Other cruelties and all kinds of atrocities, even real manhunts should have been undertaken by many Europeans in the name of „culture“ and „civilization“ against the native population of Australia who only wanted to defend their lives and property.

In any case, the native population, even if they look less novel-like and heroic as the redskins of North America, has like them doubtless been mistreated with barbaric force and displaced. The establishment of new „stations“ and „runs“ upon territories which before had only been settled by natives, wars of extermination among the various tribes displaced from their hunting grounds, the demon of alcohol, illnesses and many other aspects have reduced the number of natives in West and South Australia as well in Queensland to around 200.000 individuals.

The next cap we passed by was Cap Direction whose shape corresponds to its name as it juts out into the sea and offers a good object for steering at considerable distance.

On both sides of our fairway numerous islands and shallow reefs emerged; so just after Cap Direction the Rocky and Chapman islands, the islands Night, Binstead, Lowrie, Ellis and Morris with its anchored light house ship, furthermore the group of the Claremont islands among them Fife, Hay, Willkie, Hannah, Burkitt are the most remarkable.

The day was gorgeous, the sea was calm and of such as light-green color like many of our European continental lakes and the air was of a rare clarity and purity so that we could namely distinguish clearly the contours and the vegetation of the mainland.

A few miles in front of Burkitt islands the course was changed and Princess Charlotte Bay passed whereas the mainland retreated into the distance only to vanish completely for some time out of our view and it only reappeared when we approached the group of the Flinders islands near Cap Bathurst. The Flinders islands, not to be confused with the islands north of Tasmania of the same name, are high, mountainous islands that are known for their strange formations of their rocks and bare slopes. Some cliffs are covered with low bushes. Some of these islands, especially the island of Stanley, reminded me of individual spots on our Dalmatian coast.

The setting sun flooded the bizarre shore rocks of Stanley island with its glowing gold while the higher points of the island already appear in their evening colors. In complete darkness we passed by a light house ship that marked the passage between the Pipon islands and Cap Melville.

The life of one of the guardians on one of these light house ships may be, especially in these waters, a lonely and sad one. Cut off completely from the world, without any interaction with other living beings sit two men year for year on their light house boats, anchored at a small reef whose area extends for only a few steps. The world of these men is their light house boat and their only occupation is to light the lantern every evening. Every four to eight weeks a government steam ship comes and provides water and supplies to the guardians and only stops as long as it has to because it has to drive from one light house ship to the next one after another. Only seldom these lonesome men find the distraction of passing ships as the passage is feared due the many coral reefs and only a few ship captains dare to pass through. We had only met a single small steam boat and even this was probably just the regular supply ship. Truly, the men of the light house ship are not to be envied in their fate. Such a life as an Anchorite must deteriorate the mind and soul of these banned men into complete lethargy.

As during the day the air during the night was of a special purity. In unclouded clarity the stars were lighting down upon all of us. The cross and Taurus are the only remarkable constellations of the southern sky. An old acquaintance from the North still offered us company — Ursa Major that appeared low on the horizon. A strangeness of the southern milky way are the countless starless and thus dark spots that interrupt the white lines. Due to the clarity of the air one could directly see the stars rise out of the sea with one’s eyes only.

After repeated course corrections we reached the Howick island that were visible as black lines on the horizon. Towards 1 o’clock in the night the pilot advised us to anchor in front of the large island of Lizard, as the passage between this and the reefs of Eagle island during the night would be difficult. The commander followed this advice and had the ship set the anchor. The pilot proved to be very skilful and reliable and despite his 67 years he stood day and night on the bridge and gave his orders.

Once he had been a captain on one of the large merchant steam ships of the Australian merchant fleet and used to drive the line route to China and Japan. Now he seemed to find piloting the more profitable business. In order not to miss „Elisabeth“, coming from Sydney, he had expected our arrival on Thursday island for a full seven weeks prior to our arrival. According to his stories he had not been enchanted by his long stay on Thursday island.

Links

• Location: near Howick Island
• ANNO – on  10.05.1893 in Austria’s newspapers.
• The k.u.k. Hof-Burgtheater is playing „Die kluge Käthe“ and the k.u.k. Hof-Operntheater is performing the ballet “Die goldene Märchenwelt”.

Using the water level of the coming tide we could finally leave the harbor of Thursday island at dawn having taken a pilot on board. Through the Prince of Wales passage, past Hammond and Goode Island, we turned towards the North-East only to turn South-East soon thereafter to drive along the north coast of Wednesday Island towards Cap York and the Albany passage. This time we passed very close to the wreck of the German three mast ship „Olga“ which had run aground on the Northwest Reef. Familiar territory it was which we saw again at Cap York.

When we passed Somerset, driving through the Albany passage, we sounded the steam whistle and waved furiously with the kerchiefs to greet our friend, the „niece of the King of Samoa“ but unfortunately she did not show up but through the spyglass we could see an older gentleman, probably the then hidden pater familias who hoisted the English flag. At Fly Point we saw mighty pillars, a full row of colossal termite mounds of a rusty light-red color.

From the strait of Torres there are two sea lanes to Sydney. The first is in the open sea in the great ocean, the other is in the western part of the coral sea along the coast between them and the great coral reef which is located parallel to the East coast of Australia from about Cap York to Sandy Cap, that is from the 10th to the 25th degree of southern latitude. This Barrier Reef constitutes by the way a 1200 km long wall that falls vertically down into the sea against the waves of the great ocean and fully closes off the about on average 30 km wide passage from the East wind so that the sea here is almost always calm. This natural canal offers shallow water criss-crossed by individual deep currents and countless coral rocks, rows of cliffs, sand banks and small islands that narrow the passage in many places to the utmost.

Also the sounding has not been completed everywhere and it is not totally reliable so that only a short time ago a steam boat struck a rock at a spot marked clear on the nautical chart and sank with the loss of numerous lives. Some cliffs and shallow waters are in fact with buoys and signs; nevertheless it requires constant tight attention and when it becomes dark the services of a pilot are indispensable as both on the nautical charts and the data contained in the sailing hand books about the currents are incomplete and the buoys and signs are made out of only poles with baskets or out of wooden pyramids with wooden frames that are invisible at night. The commander decided to take the route through the reefs, following the route used by many steam ships. I thanked him much for this decision as this route is much more beautiful due to the scenery and more interesting than the one on the open sea where we would have been swung around intensively by the very fresh South-Eastern monsoon and we would have had to use much steam to fight against the headwind and the high sea waves for the largest part of the journey.

Soon after having left the Albany passage behind us and having reached Newcastle Bay, the wind became much stronger without however the possibility to really develop itself so that the sea remained fairly calm. In the East storm clouds were rising that soon cleared away and did not bother us.

The Australian coal loaded in Thursday Island proved to be of bad quality so that the ship was clouded permanently in a thick smoke and staying on the afterdeck, our usual position, became impossible. Even into all the cabins the coal dust entered. In compensation the lowering of the temperature which could be felt rather markedly was an agreeable feature and we could finally again sleep comfortably in the cabins after a long time.

The drive alongside the Barrier Reef was highly interesting: on starboard the east coast of the Australian continent was always visible at a distance of only a few miles with its offshore islands, coral reefs and banks. The coast had mostly only naked rocks blackened by the salt water or light-colored sand dunes, sometimes also a green cover of low bushes. To pass through this labyrinth of banks, cliffs and islands without accident the course had to be changed very often. The coast of the mainland itself at first appeared rather plain and showed either bare, sparsely covered land or long stretches of white sand only that glittered in the sunshine like fields of snow. Later hills with richer vegetation of trees presented themselves.

Towards 1 o’clock in the afternoon we drove past the small islands of Hushy and Cairncross which during the autumn months provide residence for numerous flocks of doves. Later the islands of Halfway, Macarthur and Bird were passed. Then came into view the protruding Cape Grenville with the group of the Home islands and to the left the long-winded Cockburn reef.

We were busily occupied with cleaning and sorting the corals fished the day before that were stored in eight large kegs filled with fresh water. Now after removing all the mud and the many parasites stuck on them we could really assess exactly what a rich catch of beautiful and diversely formed curiosities we had made at the coral reef.

After 7 o’clock in the evening one of the few light houses in these straits came into view which is located at the northern end of the Ai reef opposite the Piper islands. Even though the night was starry, we could not distinguish the smaller islands and reefs and had to steer directly towards the light house, relying only on our course and sounding, changing course close to a dangerous reef and passing by the light house by a few hundred meters. As the buoys and signs were also no longer visible and we were coming into narrow passages, it was out of prudence to anchor at 9 o’clock between Forbes island and Fair Cap and the Kangaroo Shoals to await the daybreak.

Links

• Location: near Forbes Island
• ANNO – on   09.05.1893 in Austria’s newspapers.
• The k.u.k. Hof-Burgtheater is playing „Don Carlos“ and the k.u.k. Hof-Operntheater is performing the opera “Der Wildschütz”.

One of the gentlemen who had gone ashore to visit the town had managed to find a hunting expert. He is said to be the best hunter on Thursday Island and was willing to lead us to a good spot where we could find easy prey of winged game. The goal of our expedition that started out early in the morning from the ship was this time Prince of Wales Island which we reached by the steam barge with boats in tow. We were looking for a place to land and finally discovered a bay. The water was indeed very shallow in a large area so that the barge had to stop soon but with the help of the small dinghy and the cleaning dinghy we were able to land.

The first thing that we found was a deserted camp ground of the natives where the remains of fish and tortoises, broken bottles and fire places were visible. Our guide told us that the savages have held here a big celebration and feast a few months ago which he had also attended. The most remarkable of the place was the grave of a chief, a hill, recognizable from far away by a row of three cut angled tree trunks whose number indicated a high rank of the dead, as such rudimentary decoration seemed to be made by the natives only for the graves of the bodies of noble persons. The grave hill which we visited was strangely covered with a multitude of bottles, colorful glass pieces, tins and other glittering things. Apparently the natives have a desire to decorate the graves as richly as possible to which purpose any available object is used as long as it is colorful or shiny.

Under the leadership of the hunting expert we entered into the forest alongside a ridge, as usual spread out in a line. At the start birds of various kinds showed themselves. I shot here a rare beautifully colored Bruce’s green pigeon, Prónay an enormously large nightjar. By and by the representatives of bird life became rarer and finally when the trees stood closer together and we were in a pretty valley forge with a stream flowing in its midst the hunt came to an end.

The hunting expert showed himself astonished and promised to guide us to a lagoon with much water fowl that promised better hunting opportunities for which purpose we marched a considerable far distance. Some kingfishers flew from tree to tree crying. One of the gentlemen also saw a cockatoo. Any moment the hunting expert assured us that the lagoon with much water fowl was only a few steps away until finally, after a further half an hour, we cross-examined the man and he admitted that he had been here some time ago and the lagoon had been here but must have dried up.

Perhaps the „guide“ had perceived the good hunting opportunity of the now invisible lagoon that he had boasted about so much at that native feast under the influence of the alcoholic beverages consumed. Whatever might be the case, the honest man had in vain led us in all directions, and it weren’t exactly words of praise that we shouted at him when we started the way home.

We had marched under the burning sun for 2 km before we reached again our landing place without having fired a shot. Here we were met with another surprise.

The low tide had arrived; as the tide is very strong here we found the place where we had landed in the morning was now separated by more than 600 paces of mud from the sea. Our boats were leaning at the landing place, a sad view. The barge, however, had evaded the tide and driven far out into the sea and only appeared as  a small point on the horizon.

Thus we decided to await the return of the tide, accepting the inevitable. Our sailors had in the mean time constructed a nice tent out of straps and sun coverings under a mangrove tree where we rested during the hottest hours and ate the provisions. A true plague were the myriads of flies that followed us in swarms and made every attempt of sleeping or resting completely illusionary. With true fervor they set upon their victims so that we had to defend ourselves all the time.

Later we examined the grave of the chief. Armed only with hunting knives some of the gentlemen started opening the hill wishing to discover gems or at least the skull of the dead man. But neither the ethnographic nor the anthropological collection on board of „Elisabeth“ received any additions from this dig; When all the bottles and tins had been cleared and we had, not without effort, dug down to the interior of the grave, we found only a few burnt bones and a large stone which we took as a souvenir despite its weight.

As the time had advanced we had to think about reaching our barge. Still the desired tide waves were not visible even though many hours had passed since our return from the hunt. Thus there was nothing left to but to relinquish the use of the boats for the passage and to remove our shoes and walk the the way up to the barge. This was no light undertaking given the considerable distance. We sank down to our knee into the deep mud at every step and our naked feet were cut by sharp shells and coral pieces. After some time we finally reached the steam barge totally wet, dirty and with bleeding feet. A part of the crew we had left behind at the stranded boats. Only towards 7 o’clock in the evening the tide was high enough so that our vehicles could be put to water and return.

I used the rest of the afternoon to visit Port Kennedy that made a friendly impression from afar, that is from the harbor. Up close, this disappears. One is looking at a most recently built town which everywhere carries signs of the incomplete, of hasty work. The only building material used is corrugated iron sheets. Roofs, walls, doors, everything is made out of this material with which one naturally quickly constructs a house. The surrounding of this stiff bare tin houses offers a desolate view. There are no gardens, no tree, everywhere there are sprawling weeds, The roads and paths are only marked and the garbage is accumulating in large heaps in front of the windows.

With a number of inhabitants of only 2000 souls, the great number of hotels, restaurants and billiard rooms which can be explained by the fact that Port Kennedy serves as the place of leisure for the mother of pearl fishermen who live here or on neighboring islands. For the last few years they have spent, even wasted notable amounts of their often considerable profits in the shortest of time. As mother of pearl fishing is an industry whose profits provides the entrepreneurs and merchants large sums of profit every year and these people ignore the finer pleasures but are no stranger to luxury they seek in Port Kennedy to empty the cup of pleasure as carefree as possible, as long as gold remains in their purses. Those fishermen whom fortune only gives now and then a few sovereigns intend, as humans tend to do, to copy the behavior of the rich in their luxurious life and waste their last shilling, without regard of their uncertain future.

A conglomerate of the most diverse peoples and humans is united in this small town. Ambling through the streets we met the strangest characters. The main contingent naturally were Australians, mother of pearl fishermen and squatters, among them many debauched suspicious looking guy with the common large hat on a shaggy head and the never absent revolver in his belt. Then there are Austral Negroes, South Sea Islanders, Chinese, Japanese and even Sinhalese.

Here I made for the first time the disagreeable acquaintance of overly strict provisions of the English Sunday. After our foot march through the streets of Port Kennedy, Gratzl and I wanted to drink a refreshment in the first hotel of the town and ordered a bottle of beer from the landlady that we wanted to drink on the hotel terrace and enjoy the view of the harbor. But she immediately explained that our plan to drink beer on the terrace would not be possible as, she added, on Sundays this would be considered a public nuisance. She could in the best case only permit us to drink alcoholic beverages in a closed room, even in the case of beer. Whether we liked it or not, we had to comply and drank our beer not in the open in the cool evening air but in a hot dark room. As much as I am used to respect any kind of religious customs, this subtle rigorousness seemed to me to go too far and make no sense.

We soon turned our back to the cool tin town with its strange inhabitants and rushed on board to where I had invited the resident to dinner. At the dinner I probably opened for our national goods a new sales territory. The resident was namely were pleased with our Gießhübler water and assured that he would immediately order a batch of this excellent fizzy mineral water for his personal use.

Viennese ad for Mattoni’s Gießhübler mineral water

In the evening a delegation of three persons of mother of pearl fishers came to deliver an address to me and offer at the same time various specimens of mother of pearl among them multiple with cut figures. The business of fishing mother of pearl is highly profitable here. The people own a whole fleet of small cutters with which they drive to suitable locations to have divers get the shells. The shells are then cleaned and are packaged and shipped. The price of a ton of mother of pearl is now around 1320 fl. in Austrian currency. Only rarely are pearls found here; it is after all only mother of pearl, the inner coating of the shell of the perl oyster which is collected. As the shallow places in the surrounding of Thursday island have mostly been fished empty, the divers have to go down to the considerable depths of 30 and 40 m, where there are many accidents. It is said that every month there are five to six fatalities on average.

Links

• Location: Thursday Island
• ANNO – on  07.05.1893 in Austria’s newspapers.
• The k.u.k. Hof-Burgtheater is playing Goethe’s „Faust“ and the k.u.k. Hof-Operntheater is performing the opera “Merlin”.