Elshender: A Tale of a Poor Man

By Matthew Simon Alexander

James "Elshender" Alexander was born poor and remained so for the duration of his life. His struggle was one of survival, beset on all sides by the 'laws of the land' which made such a task increasingly difficult. A man who found his way from the lowlands of Scotland to Lower Canada, in search of a life free from interference from over-zealous authorities. On his return to Scotland, to aide his wife's mental health problems, the authorities would not leave him be, and eventually fabricated a charge that would see Elshender transported for life to Tasmania, the largest penal colony of its time.

There has yet to be retribution for the indiscriminate wielding of tabula rasa. Elshender: A Tale of a Poor Man is one small step in this direction, linking the stories of Scotland's poor with the Haudenosaunee of Lower Canada, and with the indigenous peoples of Tasmania.

Edinburgh Courant newspaper report, 29th October 1840:

Ingenious Mode of Escape from Prison

'On Friday morning, an untried prisoner of the name of Alexander, better known by that of the "notorious Elshender," made his escape from Lanark jail, in which he was incarcerated on a criminal charge. He was permitted to go into the court for some article, when, finding a rope, he tied it to the handle of a spade, which he also got hold of in the court. He then threw the spade over the wall, twenty feet in height, and it fastened to the cope-stone, when he easily ascended to the top, fixed the spade to the other side of the cope, and swung himself down to the bottom, which having gained, he made a good run for it, and has not since been seen or heard of. He is described as a dangerous character, and is charged with a great many crimes, the conviction of any one of which would infer the punishment of transportation. He broke out of the old jail, and was captured only a short while ago at Carnwath, where he was put into a school room, his hands tied behind his back, and a couple of sentinels placed over him. By rubbing the cord against the chimney-piece, he succeeded in disengaging his hands, and immediately dashed through a window, and would have effected his escape; but a troop of yeomanry, who happened to be ready mounted, immediately started in pursuit. He held out even then, until he became alarmed on seeing an officer belonging to the corps marching forward with a pistol, and another with his sword drawn, when he surrendered.'

Edinburgh Advertiser newspaper report, 13th November 1840:

Apprehension of a Desperate Robber

'Our readers will recollect, that on the 23rd of last month, James Alexander, or Elshender, a notorious robber who had earned himself the sobriquet of "The Modern Rob Roy," had broken out of Lanark jail, where he was incarcerated, charged with a desperate act of highway robbery; and that £20 was offered by the authorities there for his apprehension. Since then the police have been on the alert, to discover the daring freebooter; and having got a hint that he was likely to visit Hallow Fair, Sergeant-Major Colquhoun traced Elshender on Wednesday afternoon to a house in Bruntsfield Links, where, assisted by the criminal officers of the Establishment, and Mr Currie, Chief Officer of Police at Lanark, they pounced upon him and a confederate named Somerville. Both Elshender and Somerville are strong and desperate men, and they made a powerful resistance, but Colquhoun and his party succeeded in overpowering them both, and in dragging, or almost carrying them bodily, to the cells of the Police Office, where they were safely lodged, to be dealt with according to the law. The farmers in the west of Edinburghshire, as well as those of Lanark and Linlithgowshires, will, we believe, feel relieved by the knowledge that Elshender is at length in safekeeping.'

• Language: English
• Publisher: Matthew Simon Alexander
• Release date: Apr 30, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301114290

Matthew Simon Alexander

Matthew Simon Alexander holds an MA in Contemporary Literature and Culture from the University of Manchester. He is currently undertaking a PhD English at University of Liverpool. His research focuses on David Foster Wallace's corpus around the broad theme of gender relations. Academic publications: On the Notion of "Failure" in David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest: A Consideration of Joelle van Dyne's Character and the Figure of St. Teresa of Avila - http://www.excursions-journal.org.uk/index.php?journal=excursions&page=article&op=view&path%5B%5D=214 David Foster Wallace and Repressive Taboos: Clenette Henderson, yrstruly and the identity politics of representation - https://www.academia.edu/33249759/David_Foster_Wallace_and_Repressive_Taboos_Clenette_Henderson_yrstruly_and_the_identity_politics_of_representation Engaging with David Foster Wallace's Hideous Men - http://community.dur.ac.uk/postgraduate.english/ojs/index.php/pgenglish/article/view/180 Queer and Transgender Representation, and the Queering of Language in the Works of David Foster Wallace: So What [is] the Exact Pernt to that Like [?] - http://www.lancaster.ac.uk/luminary/issue5/index.htm

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ELSHENDER

A Tale of a Poor Man

By

Matthew Simon Alexander

All Rights Reserved

Text copyright © 2013

Published by Matthew Simon Alexander

Smashwords Edition

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

eBook cover image courtesy of Billy Frank Alexander http://pinterest.com/donhendricks/billy-frank-alexander-artist/

Table of Contents

Chapter One - 1869-1884 Starting Out

Chapter Two - 1844-1862 Law and Order

Chapter Three - 1841-1842 The Barossa

Chapter Four - 1840-1841 The Evidence (an optional chapter with spoilers)

Chapter Five - 1839-1840 Arrest and Escape

Chapter Six - 1834-1839 Haudenosaunee Homeland

Chapter Seven - 1834-1839 Haudenosaunee Homeland II

Chapter Eight - 1831-1833 Fated to End Badly

Chapter Nine - Birth

About the Author

Chapter One: 1869-1884 Starting Out

Hobart, Tasmania

Sarah watched from her bed as James moved about the house collecting items that would be needed in the days ahead. James was always the first to rise and was expert at going about his business in the quietest of ways in order that Sarah could continue sleeping. The bed she now lay in was fashioned so that it did not creak as James made his early morning exits. The legs of the bed were made from the trunk of a tree that James had felled the previous year; all the other timber needed for the bed had either been found or taken when the opportunity arose. It had been fastened together so well that there was next to no movement in the timbers as James and Sarah’s combined weight bore down on them each night, and rose from them each morning. Sarah stretched her arms quietly so that she could continue watching James without him noticing that she’d woken, and she stroked the strong, smooth leg at the head of the bed and remembered the day the tree came down.

James had scaled the tree, which stood just short of fifteen metres high, and had cut sections away methodically from the top so that he could control the trunk’s fall as it came down. Sarah had pulled the fallen sections a safe distance away and busily dissected them into smaller, more manageable pieces so that they could be stored, dried, and later used as fuel. The smaller, twiggy stems, and leaves, she discarded on the ground around her so that the birds and creatures could make use of them. It took the best part of a day to finally bring the tree down and to cart the fire wood back to the house. After a night’s rest, James began selecting the part of the trunk that provided the most uniform thickness from which to make the bed’s legs. Sarah’s job was to counter James’ force as he sawed through the wood by pushing her body into the fallen trunk in an attempt at keeping it still so that James could produce a perfectly flat and smooth finish.

The tree was around three or four years old and was a fast-growing variety that produced tall, straight trunks that would eventually grow to seventy metres in height, with a diameter of two metres at the base. James began by marking the sections with nicks to the surface of the bark. He returned to the first of these and began applying a light downward force as he moved the saw slowly backwards and forwards, gauging the angle that he needed to proceed with in order to produce the finish he required. The whole of his arm from the shoulder joint to the tips of his fingers were moving rhythmically with the flow of the biting metal teeth of the blade. Sarah remembered the intense aroma that came with those first few incisions into the trunk, and the small globules of sap that had bled from the tree overnight to form clear, hard balls of sticky resin along the bark, as if to remind the perpetrators that the tree was a living thing that also bleeds when cut.

Once the four sections had been cut, following five lengthy bouts of sawing, Sarah and James took two sections each and carried them back to the house. Not much remained of the tree that had been sacrificed at the sight. Its stump was low and close to the ground and the four distinct rings would soon be covered by leaf mould and fungi and other bits of forest debris, and what was left of the remainder of the trunk would soon become home to a host of insects and various other creatures. Back at the house they began stripping the bark, a tough papery-looking bark that once removed revealed a bone-coloured trunk beneath. It took James the rest of the day to construct the bed and Sarah now recalled the pungent smell that came from the legs the first night they slept in it. Sarah pulled herself closer to the leg so that she could press her nose against it and catch a faint scent of the memory once more.

Feeling sad at the prospect of having to leave her bed for the last time, Sarah rose, stretched and clothed herself, ready for the business at hand. The several days’ sailing ahead of James and Sarah would be a daunting prospect. Both were capable of handling small sailing vessels but even so, some very inhospitable waters lay ahead until they finally landed at their destination. The reason for their departure this day was James’ appointment as gamekeeper on Lady Franklin Island, commonly known as ‘Betsey’ Island. The island itself was situated one mile east of Storm Bay midway between Cape Direction and Cape Contrariety, and was three miles from the nearest shore suitable for landing small vessels akin to the one they were soon to be readying for departure. The boat had undoubtedly been stolen many times in its lifetime for this area of the world was populated by, arguably, some of the most dubious criminal characters of the age. James had taken ownership of the boat the night before after a heated round of bartering that had occurred in one of the many liquor houses that littered the shores of Hobart, Tasmania: formerly known as Van Diemen’s Land.

‘C’mon Tommy, I need a boat and you have a boat and yet you never use the boat these days. Name your price.’ Tommy named a price. ‘Name another price pal.’ Tommy named another price. ‘I said name another price pal.’

James stood up and towered large over Tommy and left him in no doubt as to what would happen if a fair price could not be agreed upon. James was regarded as a fair man by most people who knew him, but he was also known for his quick temper and his capacity for violence whenever he felt someone was attempting to get one over on him. A silence spread through the mostly raucous bar until all eyes were on James and Tommy, and their business deal. The flames from the hanging oil lamps leaped and flickered in anticipation. Sensing the start of a flare-up that could end up costing him dearly in furniture costs (to replace the tables and chairs that would undoubtedly be broken and made into weapons at the first sign of trouble), and sensing an opportunity to profit from the deal himself, the barkeeper of the liquor house chipped in with some useful advice.

‘How’s about you settle for three months’ worth of drinking as the price of your boat Tommy? All you can handle? What do you say James, does that sound fair?’

‘Aye, Bill. What say you Tommy?’

‘All drinks for me and my cronies?’

‘No, just you... don’t take the piss now or you’re on your own son. C’mon Tommy, he won’t ask you again.’

‘Okay... deal. Shake on it James.’

James took the feeble paw and squeezed a little harder than usual just to emphasise the need for Tommy to remember to honour this most dubious of business deals. After a few more drinks and an unnecessarily long account from Tommy as to his past exploits smuggling bootleg whiskey up the coast in James’ newly acquired boat, James and Tommy left together to inspect the boat in its moorings a short walk away. James hoisted the sail to take note of its condition, inspecting it closely and with care – wind battered and probably in need of some repair before too long. He also took longer than Tommy expected in his handling of the oars, placing each one across his knee and testing their strength by mustering his own strength as he made use of his strong broad shoulders to bear down on the wood, testing for signs of obvious weakness.

He made a small murmur of approval before making his way to the back of the boat to feel the rudder below the water line. The intense saltiness of the sea stirred oppressive memories in him as his face came close to the lapping waves. The anti-reflection of the rippling blackness served to hem James’ thoughts into a corner of his mind so that now the air in his throat caught for a moment, unable to pass up or down, and the lungs started to burn as his chest responded with a tightening that caused the veins in his neck and head to feel as if they were seconds away from bursting. Legions of tiny, lightning-fast flies distracted from their erratic dance above the water’s blackness collectively rose with the intention of greeting his presence in their midst, almost as if they recognised his scent as a long lost friend and wanted to show their appreciation of its return by reacquainting themselves with the source of the pungent aroma: James’ earlobes and nostrils and eyes and mouth. This violation, in miniature, combined with the motion of the rocking boat on the sea’s matte black surface brought forth images in his mind that were now breaking loose, swamping his thoughts and distracting him from the job at hand of inspecting the vessel. As the first breath pushed down into the lungs and back out again, bringing with it the feeling of a physical blockage in James’ throat, anger seethed inside him; an anger that had been repressed, forgotten, denied and withdrawn for so long that James almost didn’t recognise its presence upon its return. Now that he did, James rose up and grabbed Tommy by the neck. He lifted the man’s feet from the floor and brought his face closer to his own.

‘See if you welch on this deal pal... I’ll be quick to find you... wherever you run and hide... I’ll find you. You got that?’ James released his grip and settled Tommy’s feet back on the sandy shore. Tommy scuttled across the shore quick to conclude that he would indeed keep to his part of the deal. Eager to benefit from the terms of the deal he headed back to Bill’s bar for the first of the down payments to come in the next quarter.

James turned, pleased with the purchase of his new boat and headed to the shore also, but he now had a need that drink could not satisfy. He made his way past the scores of drinking establishments, nodding and muttering the odd word of recognition to the many people he passed along the way, most of whom would still be there when James returned in the morning to embark on the voyage to Betsey Island. The walk was not as straight-forward as he would have liked because he is stopped almost every other step by a variety of women, all of different shapes, sizes, age, and state of health, and all inquiring as to his sexual appetite that evening. It seems that the women are having a slow night and are eager to pounce on anyone who might have a small amount of money which they might be tempted to part with in exchange for a special kind of hospitality the ladies are known for in these parts.

‘Looking for some?’

‘You want a piece?’

‘Want some fun, lovely?’

‘I’ll bring my friend here... have her as well... won’t cost no more... how about it?’

‘I don’t smell... here see, I just washed?’

‘Thanks but I’ll do fine by myself.’ James repeats this mantra a few dozen times before turning away from the coastal road and heading inland a short distance to his home, and Sarah.

‘Home’ is not exactly the right word for it. There are four walls and a roof of sorts that keeps a good percentage of the weather out, but none of the components of the house is efficient at keeping the hordes of insects that populate the area at bay. Cockroaches are the ones that Sarah finds most repugnant and least likes finding in her bed during the night. The smaller insects are just plain annoying and the larger things, spiders and so on, are usually easy enough to catch and place outside – although neither James nor Sarah has ever questioned the logic that they adopt in the humane removal of said insects. Neither one has ever contemplated squashing or squelching a bug. Why would they? After all, they’d been here longer than any human inhabitant. That is not to say that James and Sarah would not be pleased to live somewhere free from such nuisance. Betsey Island would hopefully be such a place.

James busied himself making the final preparations before setting sail. Sarah loaded the vessel with what little belongings they had and with such provisions that would see them with food until James could return to the mainland. She made sure to take extra care when loading James’ guns. Each one had been cleaned the night before whilst James was out buying the boat. Sarah had dismantled all the parts and cleaned them before oiling them and reassembling. She had then taken each gun out in turn and had shot whatever critters were available, firstly to test the accuracy of the weapons in their cleaned state, and secondly to provide valuable nutrition for the first few work-laden days that they would face on the remote island. All parts of the animal would be used. The inner organs would provide a rare treat of sweet-tasting delicacies, the meat would be cooked and salted for shelf life, the bones would be used for stock in soups and broth, and the skins would be fashioned into useful garments or be used for cleaning purposes. The stock of ammunition had been wrapped carefully to prevent exposure to the salt air that could result in misfiring, or worse – backfiring; and given that the two would be alone, at least a three mile voyage from the nearest shore, the guns needed to be in perfect working order. James had every confidence in Sarah’s abilities as a gunsmith and happily left her to the task.

The longest part of the journey to Betsey Island was going to involve reaching the area of the mainland from which they could sail the three miles to the island. This would take James and Sarah a few days and as there was no rush to get there, James had devised the safest route possible to avoid any unnecessary damage to the boat. From Hobart they would sail south down the coast to Kingston before heading due east to Opossum Bay and continuing south, and eventually east, around South Arm. The weather looked good for such a journey. The wind was sufficient to keep the boat at a steady pace, but was mild enough to prevent undue stress to the worn sail. The clouds offered enough protection from the heat of the sun. The sea was calm. James and Sarah took turns navigating the boat. Part of the reason for this was that both were equally skilled in handling small sailing boats. Part of the reason was plain common sense, ensuring that both partook in periods of vigilance, and rest, in equal measures. Another part was that they loved to watch each other. It didn’t matter what they were doing, there was a sense of self-sufficiency in their uninterrupted gazing.

James’ particularly enjoyed sitting and watching Sarah skin an animal and separate its bodily parts. There was nothing sadistic in this, just sheer admiration for her skill in performing such a task. She was able to split any animal with one strong but steady motion with a hunting knife. She dislodged joints from sockets, cut bones into smaller and more manageable sizes, identified the choicest cuts of the animal and when she had finished doing all of this, the way she laid them out on the table was in such an orderly manner that James often thought that she could reassemble the thing perfectly, if she chose to do so. James himself had a knack for killing and hunting animals but his skills with animals ended there. On the few occasions that Sarah had allowed him to skin and bone a creature, the result was of something that looked mangled and largely inedible and unrecognisable from its original form.

James now watched Sarah guide the boat away from Hobart keeping total control over the vessel as she managed the sail boom and rudder with effortless ease. The gentle waves meant that James could lie back and feel the invigorating warmth of the day’s sun on his skin as he marvelled at Sarah. Her skin, he thought, often looked to him so pale that it seemed as if she had been born in a world devoid of sunlight, like that of the grubs that he’d regularly unearth whilst uprooting vegetables. He especially enjoyed this aspect of her when she was without clothes. Every inch of her body was exactly the same shade of subterranean pale. He enjoyed watching the muscles in her arms tense as she exerted force to guide the boat through the water, her veins now beginning to bulge under the strain of being caught between her supple pale exterior and the swelling muscle tissue. He liked to follow the lines and tried to find ones that resembled the sea in colour. One such vein was bulging strong with a blue-green tone that perfectly matched the hue of the lapping waves. It appeared dead-centre on her bicep, just below where she had forced the sleeve up as far on her arm as it would go.

As the boat motioned on the gentle waves, the vein caught different aspects of the sun’s light and appeared every now and then as a pulsating fissure straining for superiority and eventual liberation from its rooted position. Occasionally James’ enjoyment of watching this particular vein was interrupted as her hair settled over her arm as she twisted her head up to check on the sail and the motion of the wind. The best way he’d been able to describe the colour of her hair was by likening it to that of sweet potato slices that are cut fine enough so that they appear diaphanous. Like Sarah’s skin, James had always felt that her hair colour was obscured by some sort of mysterious coating that left it pale and muted. Seeing her hair today brought confirmation of the complexity of the colours that were involved in this charade. Rarely, occasional strands caught in the light of the sun would flash with an equally fiery burst of orangey-red but they were so infrequent and so quick to disappear that they left an illusory feel. Some seemed completely devoid of colour and appeared with a watery transparency as they shimmered amongst the soft ripples of her hair. The colour he most enjoyed was the one that reminded him of overcooked fruit and the caramelization that occurs as the fruit’s natural sugars start to leach out and react violently with searing heat.

Contemplating her hair evoked memories of its smell. A smell that James loved best as it became oilier and less clean. Although unclean, he would never think of it as a dirty smell, more a smell that returns to its rightful place after being wrongfully removed. Just as James was about to lose himself in thoughts of other smells that he loved about Sarah, it was time for them to swap roles. Now Sarah got to relax in the boat and immerse herself in thought whilst James completed the second half of the journey to Kingston. Lying back, she wrestled her sleeves back down and hoisted her dress up to her thighs to remove some of the burden of the trapped heat from the excessive fabric that accompanied women’s fashion around this time.

One of the reasons that Sarah was so keen to be going to live on Betsey Island was for the freedom from protocols of dress. When in the privacy of her own home she was mostly naked. She felt most comfortable this way and was not prudish of other’s nakedness. Unfortunately, society was not tolerant of such things and so she had to confine her body in cloth and fabric for large parts of the day. She always imagined that this was damaging to her skin and would relish the chance to be alone, or with James, and naked. Even performing everyday tasks were more enjoyable without the burden of clothing. She enjoyed the blood splashes on her hands and arms that came from skinning animals. She even took pleasure in their cooking and found that being occasionally spattered with droplets of boiling water, or fat, heightened her pleasure.

Going to the toilet was also vastly easier naked. Their toilet at home consisted of various holes around the exterior of the property that were used for a week at a time in a systematic method of sanitation. The holes could be reached from an entrance to the rear of the house and were kept private from public view by a shed-like erection that James had added onto the house. This meant that Sarah was at liberty to wander from the house to the toilet and back without clothes. And Sarah considered it to be a great liberty, and indeed extremely liberating, to be able to perform her bodily functions without first unstrapping various layers of fabric. In fact, the only envy she possessed with regard to male genitalia was the freedom it gave a man to urinate when and where he pleased, with no inconvenience or discomfort. At times of need, and without fear of fouling her clothing, she often chose to urinate standing up and had mastered the necessary direction of flow and was somewhat of an expert in judging distance and trajectory.

Such a skill was about to be tested as Sarah’s pondering had led to her bladder demanding an imminent evacuation. She hoisted herself up onto her elbows before standing and gathering the dress around her waist. She paused just long enough for James to catch a glimpse of her, before sitting on the side of the boat and shuffling her backside further out over the water. When finished she gave a cursory splash of her genitals as the boat dipped to meet the low rising waves, and settled back in the spot she had previously been in. For the rest of the journey to Kingston she recognised a look on James’ face that spoke untold volumes of how much her part-naked form had affected him in its most brief appearance. Her eyes settled on his, as if to provoke his feelings even more. She wore a smile that if ever a smile could be termed as ‘dirty,’ this one was pure filth.

With the ‘filth’ having been explored to Sarah’s and James’ satisfaction in their lodgings in Kingston for most of the night, the boat set sail eastwards the next morning heading toward Opossum Bay. The day was much the same as the day before in terms of cloud coverage, temperature, waves and wind speed. The distance to cover was roughly half the distance that had been covered the day before, but had the added annoyance that both James and Sarah were left quite tired from the night’s activities. It was also going to take roughly the same amount of time because the southerly wind that they had enjoyed the previous day was still in place meaning that they would have to tack with the wind in order to head east. Sarah was up first and her arms were soon bulging with angry veins as she set to work shifting the boom from one side of the boat to the other to best capitalise on the southerly wind.

James, in an act of vengeance for the shameful display Sarah had unleashed the day before, made more of an issue of relieving himself over the side of the boat. As he stood, he stretched his arms above his head before moving his hands toward his crotch. He unbuttoned himself and allowed his trousers to fall, not something he would usually do. He then grabbed his cock in both hands and manipulated it so that it grew enough to catch Sarah’s attention but not too much that urinating would be temporarily prevented. She focussed on it, glanced at James, then swung the boom so that her view was obscured by the weary looking sail.

‘Too much for you to handle, lassie?’

‘No, not enough... wee man!’

James proceeded to aim his urine over the side of the boat with a smirk on his face. Sarah snuck a peek under the boom with a smirk on hers. About half way across they lowered the sail for a while and dangled two poles over the side of the boat with strong lines of gut attached, and with entrails from some of the critters Sarah had shot two nights previous hooked on at the end. This was a method of fishing that both of them swore by. It never failed to tempt something from the water to take a nibble on it and, invariably, to end up getting caught on the hook. Sarah landed the first of hers quickly. James had a few more minutes of waiting before he could resume his position at the helm after having landed much smaller specimens. Sarah got to work gutting the fishes over the side of the boat so that they would be ready to eat once they had landed in Opossum Bay - which didn’t take as long as expected as the wind started to strengthen and changed to a more easterly direction so that the tacking was no longer necessary. Now it was just a case of James keeping the rudder set in a fixed position until they hit land.

James and Sarah leapt from the boat as it slid onto the sandy beach of the bay and pulled it further onto the beach using as much of the boat’s momentum as they could to ensure that it would be safe from the swell of the tide. As they looked further along the beach they could make out the faint trace of footsteps leading to a small group of people along the coast. James recognised the people as indigenous to the island of Tasmania, the last few remnants of an Aboriginal people that had walked the land for over 35,000 years in that area. James, knowing that these people would be right to be suspicious of any white man coming into their proximity, walked along the beach with a gift-offering of some of the meats that Sarah had killed. He uttered a few of the words that he knew to mean ‘friend’ and ‘no harm’ as he approached, and set the offering down far enough away from them to avoid any unnecessary confrontation arising out of a misinterpretation of his actions. He then turned and walked back to Sarah who had already gathered enough softwood from the edge of the beach where the scrubland began, and was now building the fire that would see them through to the following morning.

James had a profound respect for the way these indigenous peoples had behaved during a period that was tantamount to an extermination of their race. He had never had occasion to feel fear in their company but had witnessed their skills when hunting and admired their self-sufficient lifestyle. He was not surprised when a gift came in return from the Aborigines later that evening.

‘The meat was good. Please forgive us for not coming sooner. The white man is usually trouble for us.’

‘Yes, I know. You didn’t have to bring anything in return. I just wanted you to know that we meant no bother for you.’

‘Can we sit?’

‘Yes.’

‘Here, take a drink of this and tell me what you think.’

‘What is it?’

‘Tree sap.’

‘Jesus [coughing]... it’s strong. Sarah, try this.’

‘It’s good... jesus’ [also coughing], ‘you weren’t kidding.’

‘Here’s a small bottle for you to keep. Tied round the neck is part of a branch. If you come across this type of tree, make an incision in the bark and place a vessel at the base to gather the sap as it flows down. Clay bowls are best if you’ve got one. It’ll keep for a long time and it’s ready to drink straight away.’

‘Great, thanks. Now you try this.’

‘Nice – this whiskey?’

‘Aye, Scotch whiskey no less. Here, a bottle for you to keep. Sadly, when it runs out that’s it.’

James and Sarah and the Aborigines sat and talked around the fire for the rest of the evening. The Aborigines did not give any names and did not ask for any. They came to tell James and Sarah about their tactics of avoidance where white men are concerned and that they had been caught unawares by their arrival – it seems that too much of the tree sap had been consumed too early in the day. The group consisted of a man and a woman of similar age, presumably together, and three younger adults, two female and one male. The biggest reason