long head of white silky
flowers, was common, and a straggling naked branched species of dock, on
the parts unburnt. Thermometer at sunrise, 54 deg.; at noon, 91 deg.; at 4 P. M.,
82 deg.; at 9, 72 deg.;--with wet bulb, 60 deg.. Height above the level of the sea,
475 feet.

15TH FEBRUARY.--Mr. Kinghorne obligingly accompanied me this day, and
guided us across arms of the marshy ground. I was very glad to have his
assistance, for I saw no line of trees as on other rivers, nor other
objects by which I could pursue its course or keep near its waters; trees
of the aquatic sort and reeds grew together. At one time nothing was
visible to the eastward but a vast sea of reeds extending to the horizon.
Where the long reeds remained unburnt, they presented a most formidable
impediment, especially to men on foot and sheep, and twenty of these got
astray as the party passed through. We encamped on a bank of rather firm
ground, in lat. 30 deg. 53' 55" S. The grass was very rich on some parts of
open plains near the marshes, and the best was the PANICUM LOEVINODE of
Dr. Lindley, mentioned in my former journals[*] as having been found
pulled, and laid up in heaps for some purpose we could not then discover.
Mr. Kinghorne now informed me that it was called by the natives "coolly,"
and that the gins gather it in great quantities, and pound the seeds
between stones with water, forming a kind of paste or bread; thus was
clearly explained the object of those heaps of this grass which we had
formerly seen on the banks of the Darling. There they had formed the
native's harvest field. There also I observed a brome grass, probably not
distinct from the BROODS AUSTRALIS of Brown; it called to mind the
squarrose brome grass of Europe. Thermometer at sunrise, 59 deg.; at noon,
87 deg.; at 4, 89 deg.; at 9, 73 deg.;--with wet bulb, 66 deg..

[* Vol. i. p. 237.]

16TH FEBRUARY.--Mr. Kinghorne set out with a man of our party to examine
Duck Creek, a native boy having told him that water was to be found in it
lower down. I sent back early this morning, our native, with the store-
keeper, some of the men, and the shepherd, to look for the lost sheep in
the reeds, and Yuranigh fortunately found them out, still not very far
from the spot where they had been separated from the rest of the flock.
Our greatest difficulty in these marshes was the watering of the cattle.
We had still the Macquarie at hand--deep, muddy, and stagnant--not above
thirty feet