IN THE 'NEVER-NEVER'

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 134, 8 June 1937, Page 14

IN THE 'NEVER-NEVER'

RIGOROUS, LONELY LIFE

WHITE POPULATION OF FIVE

Daly Waters is a small red scar on the dark green monotony of Northern Australia. At one end is the aerodrome, with its huge hangar and its little petrol store; in the middle is the overland telegraph station; and at the other end are Mrs. W. T. Pearce and her husband and daughter, states a writer in the "Sydney Morning Herald." Daly Waters has a permanent white population of five, the other two being the postmaster, Murray Frayne, and his assistant, and Mr. Frayne forms the "official" part of this little outpost. The unofficial end belongs to Mrs. Pearce. Her home is a comparatively new structure, built as funds and the uncertain transport of the north have permitted. When last I saw it, her kitchen was half a galvanised iron tank, under which the temperature in the midst of the rainy season reached astounding figures.' Yet in that kitchen were produced, at short notice, the best meals in the Northern Territory. By now, I suppose, the kitchen is a real kitchen, an extension of the sturdy little building of wood and Iron which, if hopes have anything to do with it, will someday be an important halfway house in the north. Not that Daly Waters lacks importance even now., Every week a big tri-motored plane from Camooweal comes roaring in from the south, bringing passengers and mail for places still more remote. Every week it flies away at dawn, taking with it passengers and mail from Birdum, 45 miles, away. It is a romantic link with the- world outside. Instead of meeting trains, like the inhabitants of our little country towns, its inhabitants can relieve their boredom by meeting, in this primitive place, the world's most modern engines of transport. And- they think nothing, too. of getting up before dawn to say good-bye to lonely flyers. Adventure is accepted philosophically here, where all life is an adventure. The visitor is-received with polite interest, but his coming, no matter how important he may be, leaves no indelible mark on the community. Their contact with the world is slight, but in many ways they have a far wider horizon than ours. None of the women living amid the discomforts of the, north, cut off from other women and women's interests, imagines herself heroic. Just as you would apply the word "gracious" to some suburban hostess, so you would apply it to Mrs. Pearce. Like all these people of the "Never-Never," she has the knack of making you feel comfortable and expansive, of making you feel at home in unfamiliar surroundings. Perhaps it is because of her own quiet acceptance of those surroundings. ■■To the average woman visitor they would represent nothing but discomfort, lack of most amenities, of all social life, of common little comforts of the home. But to this slim, grey-headed woman, they are just life, tinged perhaps with the warmer thought that if the railway comes there will be a change for the better. , ■ IMPASSABLE ROADS. The railway is forty-five miles away, and in the wet season those forty-five miles are impassable by road. So Mrs. Pearce becomes hostess to the sixth inhabitant of Daly Waters, an aviator who flies onee1 a week thte shortest mail route in the world. His little Moth picks up whatever the big plane from the south delivers to it, and takes it to the train, patiently waiting at Birdum. A couple of hours later it is back in its hangar and its work for the week is done. For four months every year it -replaces the land mail, and then the "dry" begins and the roads are*open again, and again the white population is reduced to five. ■ ■ ■ . Fourteen-years-old Rita Pearce has for playmates a silky terrier, a big cattle dog, and a baby emu. The little legs of the terrier are not very adequate among the spinifex, but the cattle dog is at home in the bush, and the emu, despite his youth, takes everything in. his stride. Every evening the dogs chase him about for ten minutes or so, not with any hope of catching him, but with the sheer exuberance of their relief after the day's heat, and the gawky chicken enjoys every minute of the game. His sidestep at full speed is something to make an international footballer envious, and his lightning swerves among ; the tall grass are almost breath-taking. He never leaves, but just for safety's_ sake his young owner, after "a spirited wrestling match which he is not yet big enough to win, locks him up every night. The goats, which are the local milk supply, are also locked up, not only because they will stray, but to protect them from the dingoes. These are not the only savage pests of the north. There are also death adders and the most malicious ,stinging flies in Australia, and friendly scorpions are likely to turn up in dark corners of the house. One of them wa\ked over Rita's bare foot one night when she* was at her lessons. She calmly killed it, packed it in a cardboard box, and sent it down to the telegraph station with her next batch of exercises. Isolation has made this child rather more grave and reserved than other girls of her age, but she has none of the awkward shyness so often found in city chiliren. .