ading over a depressed and barren waste, void of trees or vegetation
of any kind, its level surface being only broken by small doones of red
sand, resembling islands upon the dry bed of an inland sea, which, I am
convinced, at no distant period did exist there.

"On the 1st September, we encamped upon a long, though narrow, reach in
the most western channel, at which point a low sandstone ridge, strewed
with boulders, and covered with an acacia scrub, closes upon the river.
This position is important, as a small supply of grass will, I think, in
most seasons, be found on the bank of the river, when not a blade,
perhaps, may be seen within many miles above or below: my camp, which I
marked K/IV was in latitude 25 degrees 24 minutes 22 seconds, longitude
142 degrees 51 minutes. Beyond camp IV the ridge recedes, and the soil
becomes more broken and crumbling; our horses struggled with difficulty
over this ground to my camp, at a small water-hole, in latitude 25
degrees 43 minutes 44 seconds, where I found it necessary to lighten some
of their loads by having buried 400 lbs. flour, and 70 lbs. sugar, still
retaining a sufficient supply to carry us to Captain Sturt's farthest, on
Cooper's Creek, to the eastward, (to which point I was convinced this
river would lead me) and from thence back to the settled districts of New
South Wales; which was all I could then hope to accomplish. At about
sixteen miles further, the ground becoming worse, so that our horses were
continually falling into the fissures up to their hocks, I was compelled
to leave 270 lbs. more of flour and sugar at my camp of the 4th
September, in latitude 25 degrees 51 minutes, at another small
water-hole, found in the bed of a very dry and insignificant channel;
here a barren sandstone range again impedes the river in its southerly
course, and throws it off to the westward, thus causing many of its
channels to unite and form a reach of water in latitude 25 degrees 54
minutes; this, the lowest reach we attained, I did not discover until my
return, having found a sufficient supply in a channel more to the
westward. In latitude 25 degrees 55 minutes, and longitude, by account,
142 degrees 23 minutes, the river, having rounded the point of the range
which obstructs it, resumes its southerly course, spreading in countless
channels over a surface bearing flood marks six and ten feet above its
present level; this vast expanse is only bounded to the eastward by the
barr