is about a foot long, and very well bearded; this fits into a socket, at
the end of a staff of light wood, about as thick as a man's wrist, and
about seven or eight feet long: to the staff is tied one end of a loose
line about three or four fathoms long, the other end of which is fastened
to the peg. To strike the turtle, the peg is fixed into the socket, and
when it has entered his body, and is retained there by the barb, the
staff flies off and serves for a float to trace their victim in the
water; it assists also to tire him, till they can overtake him with their
canoes and haul him on shore. One of these pegs, as I have mentioned
already, we found in the body of a turtle, which had healed up over it.
Their lines are from the thickness of a half-inch rope to the fineness of
a hair, and are made of some vegetable substance, but what in particular
we had no opportunity to learn." Hawkesworth's Coll. volume 3 page 232.

The above method differs only from that used by the natives of Rockingham
Bay and Cape Flinders; in that the float is another piece of light
buoyant wood--the staff being retained in his hand when the turtle is
struck. The reader will here recognize, in this instrument, a striking
resemblance to the oonak and katteelik, the weapons which Captain Parry
describes the Esquimaux to use in spearing the seal and whale. (Parry's
Second Voyage of Discovery pages 507 and 509.)



CHAPTER 7.
Cross the Gulf of Carpentaria, and resume the survey of the North Coast
at Wessel's Islands.
Castlereagh Bay.
Crocodile Islands.
Discovery and examination of Liverpool River.