Note 40 — Chapter III
Reading edition
A less serious but even more effectual method of dispersing the natives, when they became troublesome, and would not quit the settlers’ camp at night, is mentioned by Mitchell. At a given signal, one of the Englishmen suddenly sallied forth wearing a gilt mask, and holding in his hand a blue light with which he fired a rocket. Two men concealed bellowed hideously through speaking-trumpets, while all the others shouted and discharged their fire-arms into the air. The man in the mask marched solemnly towards the astonished natives, who were seen through the gloom but for an instant, as they made their escape and disappeared for ever.—Mitchell’s Expeditions, vol. ii. p. 290.