r twelve
o'clock that night, Laura came to where my bed was fixed, and asked me
to take her to see Tommy, this being her last opportunity. "You little
viper," I was going to say, but I jumped up and led her quietly across
the camp to where Tommy was fast asleep. I woke him up and said,
"Here, Tommy, here's Laura come to say 'good-bye' to you, and she
wants to give you a kiss." To this the uncultivated young cub replied,
rubbing his eyes, "I don't want to kiss him, let him kiss himself!"
What was gender, to a fiend like this? and how was poor Laura to be
consoled?

Our cowra and a friend of his, evidently did not intend to leave us
just yet; indeed, Mr. C. gave me to understand, that whithersoever I
went, he would go; where I lodged, he would lodge; that my people
should be his people; I suppose my God would be good enough for him;
and that he would walk with me to Melbourne. Melbourne was the only
word they seemed to have, to indicate a locality remote. Our course
from these rocks was nearly north, and we got into three very pretty
circular spaces or amphitheatres; round these several many-coloured
and plant-festooned granite hills were placed. Round the foot of the
right-hand hills, between the first and second amphitheatre, going
northerly, Mr. C. showed us three or four rock water-holes, some of
which, though not very large in circumference, were pretty deep, and
held more than sufficient for double my number of camels. Here we
outspanned for an hour and had some dinner, much to the satisfaction
of our now, only two attendants; we had come about six miles. From a
hill just above where we dined, I sighted a range to the north, and
took it to be part of the Mount Hale Range; Mount Hale itself lying
more easterly, was hidden by some other hills just in front. After
dinner we proceeded through, or across, the third amphitheatre, the
range in front appearing thirty to forty miles away. That night we
encamped in a thicket, having travelled only sixteen or seventeen
miles. In a few miles, on the following day, we came on to a line of
white or flood gum-trees, and thought there was a river or creek ahead
of us; but it proved only a grassy flat, with the gum-trees growing
promiscuously upon it. A profusion of the beautiful Sturt, or
desert-pea, or Clianthus Dampierii, grew upon this flat. A few low,
red granite hills to the north seemed to form the bank or edge of a
kind of valley, and before reaching them, we struck a salt