Unfortunately, this
animal carried a lot of their most necessary articles, and their loss
reduced them almost to the same state as the blackfellows who surrounded
them.
Two horses here went mad through drinking salt water, one died, and the
other was too ill to travel, and had to be left.
On December the 13th they at last reached the long-desired Mitchell
river, not without having another pitched battle on the way with the
natives. For the blacks followed them throughout with the same relentless
hostility that they formerly had shown to Kennedy, and evidently meant to
mete out the same fate to them, for whilst the party were on the Mitchell
they mustered in force, and fell upon the travellers with the greatest
determination, and it was only after a severe contest, and heavy loss had
been inflicted on the savages that they retired.
It can be imagined how these continued attacks, in addition to the
harassing nature of the country, gave the party all they knew to hold
their own, and but for the prompt and plucky way in which these assaults
were always met, not one of the little band would have survived.
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