6 p.m. the thermometer stood at 55 degrees of Farenheit, the barometer
at 30.000, and the boiling point of water by two thermometers with a
difference of 2 degrees 212 minutes and 214 minutes, respectively, our
distance from the sea coast being about 120 {180 in published text} miles
as the crow flies.

It was generally thought in Adelaide that having started so late in the
season, I should experience some difficulty in getting feed for the
cattle. From my experience, however, of the seasons in the low region
through which the Murray flows, I had no such anticipation. The only fear
I had, was, that we should be shut out from flats of the river by the
floods, as I knew it would be on the rise at the time we should be upon
it. To this point, however (and I may add, with few exceptions), we found
an abundance of feed, both along the line of the Murray and the Darling,
but at our present encampment our animals fared very indifferently, in
consequence of the poor nature of the soil. Our tents were pitched at the
northern extremity of a long flat, between the river and a serpentine
lagoon, which left but a narrow embankment between itself and the stream.
The soil of the flat was a cold white clay, on which there was scarcely
any vegetation, so that the cattle wandered and kept us about an hour
after our appointed hour of starting. There had been a sharp frost during
the night, and the morning was bitterly cold. At sunrise the thermometer
stood at 29 degrees, the dew point being 43 degrees, and the barometer at
29.700.

When we left this place, our course, for the first three miles, was along
the embankment separating the river from the lagoon, and I remarked that
although there was so little vegetation on the ground, there were some
magnificent trees on the bank of the river itself, which gradually came
up to the north-east. At three miles, however, our further course along
the flats was checked by the hills of fossil formation, which approached
the river so closely as to leave no passage for the drays between it and
them. We were, therefore, obliged to ascend to the upper levels, in doing
so we were also obliged to put two teams, or sixteen bullocks, to each
dray, and even then found it difficult to master the ascent.

Referring back to a previous remark, I would observe that the Murray
river is characterised by bold and perpendicular cliffs of different
shades of yellow colour, varying from a light hue to a deep ochre. The