15 February 1934

SOMETHING ABOUT SNAKES 

Experiences In The Bush

Old bushmen have many strange experiences with Australia's deadly reptiles, and although 'The Chronicle' does not as a rule deal in snake yarns, there are always exceptions, and the stories printed below are some of them.

What I am about to tell my readers are perfectly true anecdotes of my own adventures with snakes. In fairness to the reptiles, I have found them always more inclined to run than fight, unless attacked or hurt. 

On one occasion I was going through a survey track through thick tea-tree in the Black Swamp near the Finnis. Suddenly I stepped on a big black snake lying under some loose sticks. Perhaps the sticks saved me. I jumped to one side, and having a stick with me soon dispatched the snake— five feet long, black with a yellow belly. 

When we were children on my father's place at Port Noarlunga, one of our pastimes was digging out mice, catching them when we could in the fields and other places, and putting them in boxes and sundry tins. One day we were at this game assisted by a Scotch Terrier and a Black Retriever. We had dug a good big hole without luck when the peculiar actions of the dogs make us suspect that all was not right within. I called off the dogs and raked the loose earth away with a hooked stick. This exposed some coils of a beauty. We drove a pitchfork through the snake and yanked him out — five feet, slate grey color, and deadly as they make 'em. 

Another time I picked up a double handful of straw out of an old broken box by a stable, thinking to catch mice in it. Peeling some thing squirm and heavy I promptly dropped it and yelled out. One man milking heard me and came quickly. He introduced the butt end of a short rail and settled the career of another mouse hunter. How I was not bitten I don't know. It was early in the morning, and probably the snake was cold. He was four feet six inches, brown, and a deadly variety. 

Some years ago I was chaining for a surveyor in the northern areas. I had the end of the chain, had nearly straightened it out and was stepping back a pace or two when I placed my boots on something different in the feel to solid ground. I found to my horror I had a brown snake pinned down with both feet. Foolishly I lifted one, thus partly freeing him, and he slashed the freed part of himself twice up against my legs. But he never bit me. I gave a yell and fell over backwards. The snake came at me. I let out an other yell, and turned backwards again. Then I jumped to my feet, but the snake had disappeared. 

Up in that same country I chased a brown snake for nearly 100 yards through silver grass, with nothing better than a tomahawk, which I kept throwing after him, but missed him every time. Finally, I saw him disappear down a hole, like the swirl of a stock-whip. Snakes can travel some pace, too, when they like. 

One day three of us were kangarooing in the South-East, with guns. Crossing over a timbered limestone ridge, we saw a large brown in front of us. I threw the gun to my shoulder and fired at him, striking him about the middle of the body. The snake was close to a hole in the limestone, and he managed to wriggle down it as far as the broken part of his body. But he could get no further, and stuck there. Then, in my excitement, I did a very foolish and dangerous thing. I grabbed him by the tail, intending to wrench him out. Suddenly he turned up beside himself inside the hole, and came out like lightning, and his head shot past within half an inch of my naked hand. I swung him into the air and he came down 20 feet away. My next shot blew him to pieces. 

During my wanderings in S.A. I have seen and killed the following varieties: — The Black Swamp Snake, four to five feet long, with red belly, also with yellow belly; the Brown Snake, four to five feet long, of a grey brownish color, very venomous; the smaller Black Snake, usually about two feet long, but deadly; the Death Adder, about two feet long, and the South-Eastern Tiger Snake, color, grey, very deadly. The Diamond-Headed Snake I have also met, and a variety of smaller ones that I don't know much about. I never met the largest Australian snake, the Carpet variety, which in the tropics reaches a greater length and size than any of the others mentioned.— G. A. PAYNE, Marino Rocks.

An Experience In The Bush

Once, when out prospecting with my brother, we discovered a waterhole and decided to make our camp alongside for the night. It was far too hot to go any further, so we pitched the tent under the branches of an old ironbark tree. 

After having had a meal, my brother was lying on his bunk, and I was lying on the flat of my back, with my hands clasped behind my head. We had tired of talking, but the heat made sleep impossible. Suddenly I heard a tense whisper from Jack. 'Snake!' he half hissed. 'For God's sake, don't move!' 

Then, from the corner of my eye, I saw a huge black snake moving slowly towards my brother, whose face was white under the tan of his skin, I saw the snake crawl over Jack's out-stretched, arm and on to his chest. There it stopped, staring into Jack's open eyes. I expected it to strike at any moment. Doubtless it would have done so had he so much as moved an eyelid. Having stared at Jack for a time that seemed hours, but was really a matter of seconds, the reptile appeared to be satisfied that there was no danger. 

Then my turn came. I could see, still out of the corner of my eye, the pinkish yellow of its belly, the shining, black skin of its body, and the flat, wicked looking head, gradually drawing nearer to me. The horror of it was enough to have turned my hair white. I wondered it didn't. 

Just as in my brother's case, when it reached my chest it stopped and turned its head towards my face. Would the brute never move? I lived through many years in those few seconds. Then, to my intense relief, it began to move away, evidently satisfied regarding me, too. 

'Don't move!' again whispered Jack. Suddenly there was an explosion, like the firing of a 4.7 gun. After the snake had left my chest, my brother had very slowly and cautiously grasped his rifle, which had been lying alongside him. Then, silently turning over to his left side, he had taken aim at the brute's head, which was completely blown off. I was still a little deaf from the explosion so near to my ears, and was shaking like an aspen leaf. We looked at each other for a few seconds, and then shook hands, Jack remarking, 'Well, I guess that's the nearest I have ever been to a sticky death.' — 'A.D.,' Adelaide.

Early Days In S.A. 

In 1851 the four brothers Thomas, Samuel, Matthew, and Charles Goode were trading in Adelaide. Three remained there and formed the business of Goode Brothers, in later years Matthew Goode & Co. Then Matthew and Charles left the firm, and with Mr. Durrant, of London, established the firm of Goode, Durrant & Co. The elder brother, Thomas, in 1852 moved to Goolwa, and started store keeping. The business is still carried on by a grandson. 

At that time, financed by a grant of £10,000, known as the King's moiety, the work was begun of the Port Elliot breakwater, wharves, &c., a tramway line to Goolwa, stores, and Government residence. There was no need to be short of meat. One only had to shoot geese, ducks, or swans from the river bank. The natives would float out, carrying a bush, and drift near enough to pull under water whatever game they required. 

The writer's mother and two boys were driven by the grandfather from Adelaide to Square Waterhole, a homely hostel kept by the late Mr. and Mrs. Lush. It was situated about half way between Willunga and Port Elliot. There we were met by Father Abbott with a bullock dray and taken via Currency Creek to Goolwa. 

In later years the mail cart, a two-wheel vehicle, with a pole for two horses, was driven by the late John Hart. He later was host of the Railway Hotel at Port Elliot, and then of the Hotel Port Victor, after which he retired, and built the house on the Hindmarsh River, now improved and occupied by the Cudmores. 

Square Waterhole was made the general stopping place for refreshments. There was no trade to warrant a licence, and if passengers wanted a whisky they ordered 'kangaroo's milk' in their coffee. 

The late Rev. R. W. Newland was killed when the pole of the cart broke going down Abbotts Hill. 

Brown of Keilira, the story of whose noted ride is given in Newland's 'Paving the Way,' is supposed to have ridden to the Murray Mouth, swam his horse across, and caught the mail cart at Port Elliot and the morning coach at Willunga, and proved an alibi by being seen the next morning in Adelaide—then an apparently impossible feat. 

Thomas Goode built the first store and John Varcoe the first public house in Goolwa in close proximity. 

At that time Goolwa plain was very heavily timbered, and too many native camps were near the buildings to be pleasant, especially when the wind blew from their direction. But one day Thomas Goode and his man laid a train of powder to the blacks' camps, and, on returning some time later, found the whole population, white and black, viewing a fine conflagration. 

The writer well remembers one morning being taken by his father across the plain, opposite where the slip now is, on a sandy rise. A number of black women were squatted, slapping their bare thighs to encourage the men who where fighting. It was the usual trouble— stealing a lubra from the next tribe. One black had his spear poised, and said. 'Back out, Mr. Goode, spear slip along grass and go along your foot.' The reply he got was, 'If it does I'll knock you down.' A little later, on our return, Mounted Trooper Read, on a black horse, using his hunting whip, dispersed the yelling crowds. At that time the police had the blacks well in hand, owing to the drastic action taken previously on the Coorong, when, the perpetrators of the Maria massacre were hung on the spot. 

The sailing craft Maria struck the reef off Cape Jaffa, and was so damaged that she had to be beached at the mouth of a creek, named later Maria Creek. Those shipwrecked were treated kindly by the natives, who arranged, as the whites thought, to pilot them to Captain Hart's whaling station at Encounter Bay Bluff. But when, later, they had to cross the water, the blacks refused to go any further, saying their lives would be forfeited in the next tribal territory. The whites tried to force them, with the result that the blacks murdered them. 

Major O'Halloran, then Commissioner of Police, with a party, went down via Goolwa, learnt who the ringleaders were, and hung them in the presence of the tribe, telling them that would happen to any blacks who murdered the whites. Some of the public thought the punishment was harsh. But previous to this several shepherds and drovers had been killed by the blacks, and this lesson had a salutary effect. Possibly it was the means of saving many lives. Possibly the same treatment will be required for the Caledon Bay murderers. History repeats itself.  —Edward Goode, Kingston, S.E.

Raising The Wind

Some years ago three well-known Adelaide men went on a tour of the eastern States. While in Sydney they found there was not enough money left to buy their return ticket home. They decided that their best plan would be to go to Bondi one Sunday afternoon, and when a large crowd had gathered, to carry out a certain programme. 

One man fell into the water and appeared to be drowning. (All three friends could swim), and his mate plunged in and achieved a 'gallant' rescue. Meantime, the third man, an apparent stranger, took round the hat for the 'herd.' When the three friends again met they found that their afternoon's outing had brought in enough money for their return to Adelaide, and a little over for extras.— Wynnis J. Hughes, Wisanger.