as very rough travelling ground--worse than on the northern
side of the range. Three miles farther, we crossed another running
water, and called it Edith Hull's Springs. At ten miles farther, after
crossing several channels, we turned up one, and got some water in a
very rough and stony gorge off the main channel, which was dry. There
was very poor feed, but we were compelled to remain, as there was no
other creek in sight for some miles, and the horses, although shod,
could only travel slowly over the terribly rough ground. When we
turned them out, they preferred to stand still, rather than roam about
among the rocks and boulders for food. The day was cool; the southern
horizon, the only one we could see, was bounded entirely by red
sandhills and casuarina timber. The horses ate nothing all night, and
stood almost where they were hobbled.

In this region, and in the heat of summer, the moment horses, no
matter how fat and fresh they may be, are taken away from their
companions to face the fearful country that they know is before them,
they begin to fret and fall away visibly. They will scarcely eat, and
get all the weaker in consequence, and then they require twice as much
water as they otherwise would if their insides were partly filled with
grass. When I released our three from the hobbles this morning, they
immediately pretended to feed; but this old ruse has been experienced
before, and time was now up, to move on again. They were very thirsty,
and nearly emptied the rock basin, where we had a kind of bath before
starting. Along the foot-hills over which we were obliged to travel,
the country was much rougher than yesterday; so much so, that I kept
away as much as possible. At twenty miles we turned up a
creek-channel, which proved to be a dreadful gorge, being choked up
with huge boulders of red and white granite. Among these I found a
fine rock tarn; indeed, I might call it a marble bath, for the rock
was almost pure white, and perfectly bare all round. The water was
considerably over our heads, and felt as cold as ice. It was a
dreadful place to get horses up to, and two of them fell two or three
times on the glassy, shelving, and slippery rocks. The old grey,
Buggs, hurt himself a good deal.

Time seems to fly in these places, except when you want it to do so,
and by the time the horses got down from the water the day was nearly
gone. The feed for them was very little better than at our last
night's camp, nor