An Australian Search Party

In a former narrative, published in the preceding volume of the ILLUSTRATED

TRAVELS, I gave an account of a terrible cyclone which visited the

north-eastern coast of Queensland in the autumn of 1866, nearly destroying

the small settlements of Cardwell and Townsville, and doing an infinity of

damage by uprooting heavy timber, blocking up the bush roads, etc.  Amongst

other calamities attendant on this visitation was the loss of a small

coasting schooner, named the 'Eva', bound from Cleveland to Rockingham Bay,

with cargo and passengers.  Only those who have visited Australia can

picture to themselves the full horror of a captivity amongst the degraded

blacks with whom this unexplored district abounds; and a report of white

men having been seen amongst the wild tribes in the neighbourhood of the

Herbert River induced the inhabitants of Cardwell to institute a search

party to rescue the crew of the unhappy schooner, should they still be

alive; or to gain some certain clue to their fate, should they have

perished.

In my former narrative I described our exploration of the Herbert River,

lying at the south end of Rockingham Channel, with its fruitless issue; and

I now take up the thread of my story from that point, thinking it can

hardly fail to be of interest to the reader, not only as regards the wild

nature of the country traversed, but also as showing the anxiety manifested

by the inhabitants of these remote districts to clear up the fate of their

unhappy brethren.  I may also here mention, for the information of such of

my readers as may not have read the preceding portions of the narrative,

that Cardwell is the name of a small township situated on the shores of

Rockingham Bay; and that Townsville is a settlement some hundred miles

further south, known also as Cleveland Bay.