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139 pages

English

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The treacherous and beautiful Coral Sea is the background for this story of the nineteenth century adventurers on perilous voyages into its waters in search of the bêche-de-mer and pearl shell; of the savage chiefs who ruled its islands; of the seamen who charted it; of the explorers struggling up the Queensland coast; a tale of the taming of the wilderness and its people.
...as in all Idriess books, there is always something good somewhere; and here it is the two chapters on Jemmy the Hook, who had had both hands chopped off by mutinous islander-crews, and who returned with iron hooks instead of hands to take a gruesome vengeance on yet another mutinous crew; it is a story which calls all the Idriess descriptive powers into play, and the reader avid of blood-and-guts can be assured of exactly that. - The Bulletin, 1957
As so often in Australian letters, an initial fall into obscurity and harsh judgments of the literary establishment serve as good indicators of a writer's pre-eminence. - Nicholas Rothwell, The Australian, 2017

Sujets

Historical

Lettres et linguistique

Biography

Autobiography

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Publié par	ETT Imprint
Date de parution	01 mars 2023
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781922698568
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	2 Mo

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Extrait

This 6th edition published by ETT Imprint, Exile Bay 2023
First published by Angus & Robertson Publishers 1957 Reprinted 1957, 1980, 1981 First published by ETT Imprint in 2022 First electronic edition published by ETT Imprint in 2022
This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Inquiries should be addressed to the publishers:
ETT IMPRINT PO Box R1906 Royal Exchange NSW 1225 Australia
Copyright © Idriess Enterprises Pty Ltd, 2022
ISBN 9781922698575 (pbk) ISBN 9781922698568 (ebk)
Cover: On board a pearling lugger, Thursday Island, 1936
Designed by Tom Thompson
CONTENTS

Towards the Unknown North
The Continent Awakening
The Melting-pot
The Great Reef
The Lost Strait
Where the Sea-slug Feeds
Brave Days of Sydney Town
When Iron is Gold
First with the News
Skulls and Shipwrecks
Still the Wild North
The Patriarchs Move by Land, the Explorers by Sea
And a Tower is Built
Towards the Peninsula At Last
Great Events in the Coral Sea
Time Brings Change to All
The Gold and Ships and Killings of Ordinary Men
Ahoy, Bluebell!
Jemmy the Hook
The Third Time
Somerset is Born
The Great Trek
The Attack
Queensland Strikes Gold
The Second Singapore
For the Coral Sea, the Moving Finger
The Lesson Begins
Something New Comes to Kebisu
The Great Discovery
Treasure of the Sea
The Settlement's First Man-o'-War
The Sea of Pearls
Vengeance
Chester Finds His Great Ambition
The Chief Kebisu's House
Notes

Publisher's Dedication
For
Dr Jeremy Robert Greenwood
Who followed his curiosity
17th August 2022, Mackay Reef in the Coral Sea
Author's Note
THE full story of Australia's Coral Sea would occupy numerous volumes. Having often been surprised at how little we know about this fascinating little sea so peculiarly our own, I'll tell you a little about it; but only up to the time of the first pearlshell rush. After which, should you desire to know more it will be my pleasure to oblige-though only in a matey sort of way, for the "Big Story" must be left to pens far more capable than mine.
There may be an error or two in the earlier portion of this book, for in Australia's very early days only scanty records were kept. Indeed, no records at all were kept of many subjects, or if they were they have been lost, thus complete accuracy is almost impossible in recording many events. However, even the very early events narrated here I believe to be as accurately set down as possible - to a sweet-tempered, irritable little scribbler such as me, anyway.
But the greater part of the book is written upon my own stamping grounds, and you can confidently take the Coral Sea with me.
In days gone by, when life aboard a smelly trepang cutter was high adventure, I listened to the old-timers of the early bêche-de-mer days yarning under the 'Tree of Knowledge" at Cooktown. Again at Thursday Island I talked with many, still hale and hearty, who had served aboard the "hell ships" in the early pearling days. And I met the hard-bitten though quietly efficient officials of that little sea of mighty reefs and romantic islets, met the pearlers of pleasant memory. At Somerset I had access to Jardine's voluminous reports and journals, and met his sons. I read Chester's records, as well as those of other Residents who in autocratic power had graced romantic Somerset and ruled as best they could the troublous waters around.
To cap all, in the Coral Sea I cruised with a quiet little man who, I believe, knows more about the islands and folk of the Strait than any man living - the Reverend William MacFarlane, "Wandering Missionary of the Strait". It was mainly through him that I was able to visit all the inhabited islands in the Strait, meet on friendly terms the last of the old island chiefs and Zogo-men, listen to their stories, their view of those long years of clash between black, brown, and white. Otherwise I would only have been able to tell you of the white man's point of view. I owe a lot to "Mac", as do others. It was through "Mac" that I first met Maino, last Mamoose of Tutu and Yam, son of Kebisu, Sea Chief of Warrior Island. But you will meet Kebisu and Maino in this book. So, step aboard the lugger, and sail with me.
ION IDRIESS

I
TOWARDS THE UNKNOWN NORTH
WHO were they?
Only the winds sigh answer.
Men in a boat. A boat with a song in her rigging, stoutly built, bowling along under jib and mainsail, foam at her bows, under Australian skies. Nearly a century and a half ago - only a sigh from yesteryear.
You could not swing a cat in that craft, a man must "monkey" his way to crawl into the bunks for'ard. She would smell of sea things, of tarred oakum and bilge and fish-baits and tough meats stowed in the brine-casks, of salt-sprayed clothes and rope, and rank tobacco smoke. Hungry brown and red and yellow cockroaches, impatient of daylight, big cheeky fellows. with ginger feelers, would poke inquiringly out from her timbers even before sunset and scuttle all over her as darkness fell. Stealthily at first, but on hot nights their creepy rustling would drown the very breath of the ship. Their sharp teeth with eerie sound would gnaw to the quick the horny toenails of the uneasy, tossing sleepers, nibble the hair above their ears, slithering back up the head just out of reach of nervy fingers, diving back to the meal as the sleeper's hand slid limply away. Just so, a hundred years later, by the hot, murky glow of the hurricane lamp, I have watched them feasting on the toenails of our snoring crew on suffocating nights. How those diamond points of sweat used to glisten on those brown, hunched up, naked bodies!
Such a little sail, a brave sail gliding north, into the unknown north upon a great big sea. An empty sea-though presently they glimpsed a vanishing sail, by the cut of her jib a Yankee whaler from Hobart Town bound for the mysterious Islands-maybe the Sandalwood Isles, or the New Hebrides, the dangerous Solomons, the Marianas, or perhaps some Samoan Paradise, or the cannibal "Fee Gees".
They would long watch that vanishing sail, voiceless link with their fellow man. They would muse about her, for Sydney Cove was full of the whalers now, their tough crews ever ready to play merry hell among the respectable waterfront inns and the less reputable grog-shops, which did not matter so much; at times in a laughing, riotous madness, amongst screams and curses and breaking furniture, they would "clean up" a hell shop, which mattered not at all. Sydney Town's vicious hooligan gangs kept to their dens when these hardened whaler crews were on the rampage. Even the redcoats steered clear of them unless in armed squads, duty bound - which is saying a lot. For armed might and deeds of violence were ordinary enough in the rutted quagmires called streets those days. The whalers, though, were welcome, for they brought trade and spending money where money was scarce indeed. And their valuable oil was grist to the Sydney merchant's mill. For this tiny port of a few thousand people, now sprung up in the isolation of the world's last continent, was growing most surprisingly virile, not only in deeds, but in trade also, smelling out the makings of an honest pound in remarkable fashion, despite the fact that Sydney's very existence was both unknown and unheeded by practically all the far-away "world". Above all, it was growing lively in ideas, far too aggressively so, in the opinion of authority and numbers of the influential gentry.
Thus the men in the boat would discuss the events of their day as the whaler's topsails melted into the far horizon. It was nearly certain that she would sail the open Pacific just outside the "Sailorman's Graveyard", that mighty Barrier Reef so feared and so little known, which was discussed in awe when sailormen met in Sydney Town. 'They in the boat must hug the coast and thus sail nor'ward inside the Great Reef.
Generally the whalers fished the waters from Hobart Town to the beautiful New Zealand Isles, stronghold of tattooed Maori warriors howling defiance from their forts. Wonderful stories drifted into Sydney Town of that shadowy dependency of the Colony of New South Wales. Other whalers vanished northward towards mysterious seas and island worlds among strange peoples, where island kings and queens were brown and black, creamy and lemony, and milky white, with black manes of hair to their knees or great fuzzy, crinkly mops in which captured butterflies fluttered. Fascinating tales those whaler crews told along the waterfront as ship after ship came sailing into Sydney Town, heavy-laden with that valuable oil. Tales of beauteous isles of everlasting sunshine where Nature grew everything the heart of man could desire, where chain-gangs were unheard of, where slavery was unknown. Where there was no such thing as prison hells, the gallows and the cat-o'-nine tails, the treadmill and the stocks. Where it was blessed rest and play all day, dance and sing and sleep all night, warm under tropic skies. Where every girl was beautiful and knew it, garlanding herself with flowers, with kisses and song and laughter garlanding her lucky man, too. Where every white man in any ship's crew, be he ever so humble, was master of all he surveyed. Entrancing tales they told also of men who had deserted ship and settled on such isles with dusky queens, and ruled as real kings. Yes, they told such tales under the very shadow of Gallows Hill.
The gaunt-faced men in the boat, hunched there with backs bent from toil, their bony hands splayed from hardship, would stare out over the starboard bow towards that vanished sail, would marvel at, would sigh over such tales, so eagerly discussed in Sydney Cove. It was certain that some tales