As the mystery of this "duck-under" lies under water, it can only be
described from hearsay. Here, so the blacks say, a solid wall of rock
runs out into the river, incomplete, though, and complicated, rising and
terminating before mid-stream into a large island, which, dividing the
stream unequally, sends the main body of water swirling away along its
northern borders, while the lesser current glides quietly around the
southern side, slipping partly over the submerged wall, and partly
through a great side-long cleft on its face--gliding so quietly that the
cleft can be easily blocked and the wall heightened when the waters are
needed for the lagoons. Black-fellow gossip also reports that the island
can be reached by a series of subterranean caves that open into daylight
away at the Cave Creek, miles away.
Getting nothing better than one miserable shag by our revolvers, we faced
damper and "Lot's wife" about sundown, returning to camp through a dense
Leichardt pine forest, where we found myriads of bat-like creatures,
inches long, perhaps a foot, hanging head downwards from almost every
branch of every tree.
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