here and there, but no indentations for
holding water could be seen. At fifteen or sixteen miles, having
passed all the ridges, and entered scrubs and mallee again, Alec and
Tommy overtook us, Mr. Young having remained behind with their camels,
and reported that they had found one small rock-hole. Alec said it had
twenty or thirty gallons of water in it, but Tommy said there was only
a little drop, so I did not think it worth while to delay by sending
any camels back so far for so little reward. We saw two or three dozen
grass-trees to-day, also some quandong and currajong trees, and camped
again in scrubs where there was only a few leguminous bushes for the
camels to eat. We had travelled twenty-eight miles, which only made
twenty-four straight. The last three days had been warm, the
thermometer going up to 98 degrees in the shade each day at about
twelve o'clock; the camels were very thirsty, and would not feed as
the provender was so very poor.

During the last few days we had met with occasional patches of grassy
and clayey ground, generally where the yellow-barked eucalypts grew,
and we passed numerous small clay-channels and pans, in which
rain-water might lodge for some time after a shower, but it was
evident from the appearance of the grass and vegetation that no rains
could have visited the region for a year, or it might be for a hundred
years; every vegetable thing seemed dry, sere, or dead. On the 13th of
October, at twelve miles from camp, we passed over some more scrubby
granite ridges, where some extent of bare rock lay exposed. I searched
about it, but the indents were so small and shallow that water could
not remain in them for more than a week after rains had filled them.
While I was searching on foot, Mr. Young and Tommy, from their camels'
backs, saw another mass of bare rocks further away to the north-west.
I took Tommy with me, on Reechy, and we went over to the spot, while
the party continued marching on; on arriving we found a very pretty
piece of scenery. Several hundred acres of bare rocks, with grassy
flats sloping down from them to the west, and forming little
watercourses or flat water-channels; there were great numbers of
crows, many fresh natives' tracks, and the smoke of several fires in
the surrounding scrub. Tommy took the lower ground, while I searched
the rocks. He soon found a small native well in a grassy
water-channel, and called out to me. On joining him I found that there
was ve