In September 1818, a group came from Sydney to join in the hunt for Howe. They wanted the reward. One member of the group was the famous aboriginal tracker, Mosquito. They nearly caught him. They did get his guns and his knapsack (a backpack). In the knapsack they found his "Journal of Dreams". It was a book made from kangaroo skin and Howe had written in it using kangaroo blood as ink. In it Howe wrote about his fear of being killed by the aborigines, his dreams of his sister, and lists of vegetables and flowers he would grow in a house in the forest. As he escaped, Howe thought Black Mary was slowing him down, so he tried to shoot her.