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little boys were the only whites present but we felt no fear having perfect confidence in King Billy who had made himself responsible for our safety. My recollections of these two events under the titles of "An Aboriginal Fight" and "An Aboriginal Corrobboree", were published in the Grafton "Daily Examiner" of July 16-1931 and copies are now in a scrap book held by the Royal Australian Historical Society, Sydney, together with the "Tindal Letters" and other items of Clarence River history.
At Bellevue ?? saw blacks robbing a bee's nest. One man extracting large pieces of honeycomb from a hole he had cut high up the trunk of an ironbark tree while his comrades below dexterously caught the luscious morsels in small sheets of bark as he dropped them from his lofty perch. The pieces were then slipped into billy cans and other receptacles while the women and children enjoyed a rich feed. Blacks found bees' nests by the power of their strong keen eyes. Just as one "moons" a possum they would "own" a likely tree. If bees were there the dark bodies and gauzy wings showed clearly out against the sun rays as they flew to and from their nest.
Both on the Clarence and Richmond it was fascinating to watch the natives tree climbing with vine and tomahawk. As this method is probably a lost art it may be well to give a detailed and accurate description of it. Obtained