tions of the route
by which they had come enabled him to lead the party rapidly and safely
back to Sydney, where the leaders were rewarded with grants of land and
the convicts with tickets-of-leave.

[Illustration: CAPTAIN CHARLES STURT.]

#4. Captain Sturt.#--The long drought which occurred between 1826 and 1828
suggested to Governor Darling the idea that, as the swamps which had
impeded Oxley's progress would be then dried up, the exploration of the
river Macquarie would not present the same difficulties as formerly. The
charge of organising an expedition was given to Captain Sturt, who was
to be accompanied by Hume, with a party of two soldiers and eight
convicts. They carried with them portable boats; but when they reached
the Macquarie they found its waters so low as to be incapable of
floating them properly. Trudging on foot along the banks of the river
they reached the place where Oxley had turned back. It was no longer a
marsh; but, with the intense heat, the clay beneath their feet was baked
and hard; there was the same dreary stretch of reeds, now withered and
yellow under the glare of the sun. Sturt endeavoured to penetrate this
solitude, but the physical exertion of pushing their way through the
reeds was too great for them. If they paused to rest, they were almost
suffocated in the hot and pestilent air; the only sound they could hear
was the distant booming of the bittern, and a feeling of the most lonely
wretchedness pervaded the scene. At length they were glad to leave this
dismal region and strike to the west through a flat and monotonous
district where the shells and claws of crayfish told of frequent
inundations. Through this plain there flowed a river, which Sturt called
the Darling, in honour of the Governor. They followed this river for
about ninety miles, and then took their way back to Sydney, Sturt being
now able to prove that the belief in the existence of a great inland sea
was erroneous.

#5. The Murray.#--In 1829, along with a naturalist named Macleay, Sturt
was again sent out to explore the interior, and on this occasion carried
his portable boats to the Murrumbidgee, on which he embarked his party
of eight convicts. They rowed with a will, and soon took the boat down
the river beyond its junction with the Lachlan. The stream then became
narrow, a thick growth of overhanging trees shut out the light from
above, while, beneath, the rushing waters bore them swiftly over
dangerous snags