e amongst far noisier deaths, or die amid far louder dangers! I
often declare that:--

"I'll to Afric lion haunted,
Baboons blood I'll daily quaff;
And I'll go a tiger-hunting
On a thorough-bred giraffe."

Whenever we had east winds in this region, the weather was cool and
agreeable; but when they blow from any other quarter, it becomes much
hotter, and the flies return in myriads to annoy us. Where they get
to when an east wind blows, the east wind only knows.

Leaving Buzoe's Grave, which had proved a godsend to us, with a swarm
of eagles, crows, hawks, vultures, and at night wild dogs, eating up
her carcase, in four days' farther travel we neared the spot from the
west, where the Alfred and Marie Ranges lie. The first sight of these
ranges from the east, had cost my former horse expedition into this
region so dear. I could not help believing that the guiding hand of a
gracious Providence had upon that occasion prevented me from obtaining
my heart's desire to reach them; for had I then done so, I know now,
having proved what kind of country lay beyond that, neither I nor any
of my former party would ever have returned. Assuredly there is a
Providence that shapes our ends, rough hew them how we will. These
hills were in reality much lower than they appeared to be, when looked
at from the east; in fact, they were so low and uninteresting, that I
did not investigate them otherwise than with field-glasses. We passed
by the northern end, and though the southern end was a little higher,
I could see that there were no watering-places possible other than
chance rock receptacles, and of these there were no signs. At the
northern end we came upon a small shallow kind of stony pan, where a
little rain-water was yet lying, proving that the rains we had
experienced in May, before leaving the western watershed, must have
extended into the desert. We reached this drop of water on the 25th of
June, and the camels drank it all up while we rested on the 26th.
After five days' more travelling over the same kind of desert as
formerly described, except that the sand-mounds rose higher yet in
front of us, still progressing eastwards, the well-remembered features
of the Rawlinson Range and the terrible Mount Destruction rose at last
upon my view.

On reaching the range, I suppose I may say that the exploring part of
my expedition was at an end, for I had twice traversed Australia; and
although many hundreds of miles had