LOST!

Franklin Times, Volume 9, Issue 640, 10 June 1921, Page 6

LOST!

(By an Australian Bushman.) The recent discovery of the skeleton of a lost child on the summit of the highest mountain in the Bennachie group in Aberdeenshire holds, no mystery for an Australian bushman. The skeleton is supposed to ba that of a two-year-old child lost seven years ago from a farm two miles away, and at the time of the disappearance there were apparently a number of theories put forward for the loss —that the child had been, stolen by gipsies, eaten alive by pigs, or carried away by an eagle.

But *had a man experienced in the' behaviour of lost children been asked what was likely to have become of the lost infant he would have said, “Search all the highest points within a few miles, and on one of them, unless he has perished on the way, you • will find the lost child.’ In countries like Australia, whe’re there are still vast tracks of parti-. ally settled country, the danger of “getting- bushed.” as it is called, is & % v,*. % still a real one. It is not always children who get “bushed” either. But, adult or child, unless the lost person has bush experience, he seems to lose his head at once and begins to walk and walk. If the country is flat the lost person walks in a circle, if it is mountainous he mounts and mounts a& high as he can get. He seems to get demented as he grows more exhausted and the realisation of his piobable fate becomes more clear. An hour or two before he succumbs he gets rid of his clothes. The majority of lost people are found naked. It may happen that somebody who reads this article may one day bs lest. Here, then, is a piece of advice from one with a right to give it: Directly you realise that you are lost sit down until the first panic has departed. Remember that your first consideration is to reserve .your strength. You Vvill be tempted to go uphill, to see, to get into freer spaces. Don’t do this. Go down. hi!!. All rivers flow downwards: you will find water in the valleys. Most settlements are in the valleys. And going down hill eats up less strength than climbing uphill.

In an Australian bush directly the news of a tost child is brought every man in the vicinity gives up what he is doing to join in the search, which is started immediately, as in the summer a child can die of exhaustion in a little while. In the meantime the black trackers are sent for. These are Australian, aborigines kept by the police and used by them as human bloodhounds. It is an extraordnary sight to see these trackers creeping along the ground, grunting like animals and following tracks that a white- man cannot see. They will practically always find the child in the end.