Browne with
Nadbuck to examine the locality on the morning of the 12th, as the
distance was not greater than from six to seven miles. He returned about
one P. M., and informed me that there was plenty of feed for the cattle,
and water also; but that the water was at least a mile and a half from
the grass, which was growing in tufts round the edge of the lake. It
appeared that the Williorara made a circuitous and extensive sweep and
entered Cawndilla on the opposite side to that of the river, so that he
had to cross a portion of the lake, and thus found that the floods had
not reached it. Mr. Browne also stated that the extent of the lake was
equal to that of Lake Victoria, but that it could at no time be more than
eighteen inches deep. It was indeed nothing more than a shallow basin
filled by river floods, and retaining them for a short time only. Immense
numbers of fish, however, pass into these temporary reservoirs, which may
thus be considered as a providential provision for the natives, whose
food changes with the season. At this period they subsisted on the
barilla root, a species of rush which they pound and make into cakes, and
some other vegetables; their greatest delicacy being the large
caterpillar (laabka), producing the gum-tree moth, an insect they procure
out of the ground at the foot of those trees, with long twigs like
osiers, having a small hook at the end.
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