LIFE ON THE GOLDFIELDS
This is a story about the life of a women on the goldfields:
“One night the digging party became lost in the pitch black of night after walking some distance from their camp. Luckily they eventually spotted a light, and walked towards it. But it was a dangers thing to do Luckily my brother had managed to get hold of a long stick, with which he sounded the way, for either large stones or water-holes would have been awkward customers in the dark; wonderful to relate we escaped both, and when within hailing distance of the light, which we perceived came from a torch held by some one, we shouted with all our remaining strength... Soon – with feelings that only those who have encountered similar dangers can understand – answering voices fell upon our ears… In the excitement of the moment we relinquished all hold of one another and attempted to wade through the mud singly. ‘Stop! Halt!’ shouted more than one stentorian voice; but the warning came too late. My feet slipped – a sharp pain succeeded by a sudden chill – a feeling of suffocation – of my head being ready to burst – and I remembered no more."
Bethany Newton