Interior of Australia.

Hokitika Guardian, 28 September 1921, Page 1

Interior of Australia.

XtiT AX A ini> DKKKIiT. SVDXKV. Kepi. 1-1 Wonderful journeys over remote Australia. on foot, hievcles. and moiei ■ ears stand to the credit of the lean and intrepid explorer. Francis Dirties. Hut a month or two apn he nearly met his doom. Some mishap caused the motor ear in which ]c and a compiuiion wer,. trav'-rsinp a remote part of Northern AuM ndoia to burst into flame, and before it could be broupht. to a standstill both bad been severely burnt. Painful erawlinp over several miies broupht the two to an aboriginal cam]), where they were kindly received, and assist a Me" sent tor to a ill-taut, mission station. That is about *brec months apt), and after a prim struggle with dealtli, llirtle has suflieiently recovered to come down south. The mission on wlneli lie was onpaped at tin' time of til,, accident tins an inspection at the request of the Prime Minister (Mr W. M. Duplies') of certain distant portions of the’ route of the proponed t ranseont ineiilal railway which is to traverse the continent from North to South. The fire destroyed not only the motor car. toil all the stores appar itils, and data, that Dirties carried. hill, 1 boiiph he is still sull'erinp from the ell'eots of the severe burns that, he rci reived, lie is delerminil to set out'again I at: an early date, and replace all the ! pictures that he lost. He will, be says, accomplish bis mission somehow, and will either fly. ride, or drive. ! “The inferior of Australia,” Air ' Dirties declares, “is popularly supposed I to be a vast arid desert, but’ we found ; Ibis description to be anything Iml 1 , ;. AVe pissed through v:ist areas ! covered with luxuriant grass, well Dm- ; he red. and yielding water suitable lor j domestic or locomotive purposes at i depths of 10fl downwards. In one | patch of about HO sipiaro yards (ast to 1 the telepra])li line, about tlm latitude I of the Alice Kprings, T took samples of ■SO varieties ol edible stock grass and shrubs. The disaster Happened near Klsey station, formerly the borne ol AD-s Aeneas Dunn (author of “We of the Xsver Never”!, but now an abori.lines’ namp. As the ear was ploughing its way through the long grass, it struck a hidden stump. The impact broke a drum containing benzine, j which caught lire. Immediately tlmre I was an explosion, and in a feu" seconds the ear with its load of 80 gallons of benzine, AOOOI't of cinematograph film, and cinema and cameras, photographic plates, negatives, and all the data, which bad been collected, was a class of llallies.”