There are other nuisances it would be well to see to. A woodman at Maryborough lately died of a scorpion sting; and we read of a man being bitten by a black snake while working a short distance from Brisbane. His mates scarified the wound, bound up the arm, and administered a large dose of brandy; put the patient into a cart, and made for a dispensary with all possible speed. Here the wound was scarified again; and a doctor passing by, being called in, cauterised it, and injected ammonia. In a few minutes the man's spasmodic struggles ceased, and he was able to walk to a cab. By the time he reached the hospital all traces of the venom had disappeared, and he seemed only to suffer from the effects of the spirits he had imbibed. The ammonia treatment of snake-bite is not efficacious with the lower animals; at least in a series of experiments upon dogs, not a single canine sufferer recovered. Although Queensland is reputed to be a land of rivers and streams, there are tracts where water is scarce, and those who recklessly go on the tramp, or 'wallaby,' as this kind of vagabondising is called, sometimes experience the horrors of thirst, and actually sink down and die in the wilderness.
To prove the truth of this, and to shew that examples are not wanting of travellers who have died of thirst, a correspondent of the _Queenslander_ tells how, following the tracks of some horses that had strayed from their beat, he came upon a pair of moleskin trousers hanging upon a tree, as if put there for a signal of distress. Looking about, he picked up a torn pocket, containing an illegible cheque and a match-box; and scattered about on the grass saw a blanket, shirt, hat, and water-bag. Searching further, he found the skull and bones of a man who had apparently been dead some two or three weeks; some of the flesh was still on the bones, and the brains were almost intact. Bags of flour, tea, and sugar lay near; a proof that the poor fellow had not died of hunger, but of thirst, the nearest water being twelve miles from the spot where he died his lonely death.
Thomas Stevenson, a lad of seventeen, started one December morning from his brother's station, some fifty miles from Louth, New South Wales, for the post-office at that place, which he reached safely, and left again at daybreak on the Saturday. The following Wednesday his horse arrived home, bearing his rider's coat, scarf, and spurs. His brother started for the bush with some black trackers, who found that the missing lad had been wandering on the Debil-Debil Mountains, but finding it impossible to get his horse down them, had turned back to get round the base of the mountains, but mistaking the road and overtaken by darkness, had camped out and hobbled his horse. After a three days' search the trackers discovered the body of young Stevenson lying between two logs in a lonely part of the bush. The weather had been extremely hot, and it was known he had no water-bag with him; so there was little doubt that he died of thirst. After losing his way and losing hope, he must have taken off his coat, scarf, and spurs, fastened them to a saddle, and turned the horse loose. Then placing the two logs on a track, he had lain down between them with his head resting on a cross-piece at one end, and so waited Death's releasing hand.