Mr Cargill is one of the Main Body, and returned from Anzac. He was sent down six weeks ago in indifferent health, and was returning to offer his services again. He states that he never had such a hard fight for his life, even on Gallipoli, as he has had to pass through lately. He left the lighthouse on the 5th inst. with five days' food, which under ordinary circumstances is ample. All went well the first day, and he was rejoicing in the walk and the splendid track, which was much improved by the Government last summer. That night snow came on, making it impossible to start for a couple of days, and then, when he did start, the bush was down everywhere, the track absolutely covered up, and the telephone line down from end to end. When asked why he did not turn back at this stage, being only one day from the Point, he replied ``Because I am not the turning-back sort, and, also, I did not know what was ahead, or I could not have got back quickly enough.''
After his food was done, which was several days before reaching Big River, he seems to have only a hazy idea of what happened. It was a continual climbing over logs and finding means to cross swollen creeks, which had all become raging torrents. He can remember crossing two by hanging on to a telephone wire which was down. He spent night after night under trees, not being able to reach the linesmen's huts. At one hut he came across some old flour, which the linesmen have since told him was crawling. However, he made a meal from flour and water. At another place he got a fish and ate it raw. After this his sufferings were severe, and he has not much recollection of anything until he was found by two linesmen named Donaldson and Smith. By this time he was unable to give any clear statement, as he had been out for 16 days, and must have plugged along for days in this state. At the time of his rescue he was ``done'', but he had managed to get within about 15 miles of open country at Blue Cliff. Mr Cargill expresses his thanks to Messrs Donaldson and Smith for all they did for him, as they had gone through a most trying day themselves before coming across him, and for the trouble they took and the kindness shown. He says he knows that he would not have won through but for them.
Surgeon-general Henderson (Director-general of Medical Services) has made the welcome announcement that a new method of preventing cerebro-spinal meningitis was now being tried. He had cabled to the War Office recently asking what was the latest method devised of checking the trouble, and had received a reply advising him of a new system, which he was at once putting into operation. Under this system men suffering from sore throats would be treated in specially-constructed rooms at both camps. The method was to saturate the atmosphere of the room with steam charged with a special disinfectant. Men with sore throats would be put into these rooms and left there to inhale the vapour for a period of five minutes. The disinfectant would thus get into the whole of the human air passages, which gargling could not reach. In this way large numbers of men could be dealt with and the scheme, although in its infancy, seemed to hold out fair prospects of being a success. It was designed to prevent the disease and to check it developing. - ODT, 23.9.1916.
