s dry as the desert on
either side. Almost heart-broken, Mr. Browne and I seldom left our tents,
save to visit our sick companion. Mr. Browne had for some time been
suffering great pain in his limbs, but with a generous desire to save me
further anxiety carefully concealed it from me; but it was his wont to go
to some acacia trees in the bed of the creek to swing on their branches,
as he told me to exercise his muscles, in the hope of relaxing their
rigidity.

One day, when I was sitting with Mr. Poole, he suggested the erection of
two stations, one on the Red Hill and the other on the Black Hill, as
points for bearings when we should leave the Depot. The idea had
suggested itself to me, but I had observed that we soon lost sight of the
hills in going to the north-west; and that, therefore, for such a
purpose, the works would be of little use, but to give the men
occupation; and to keep them in health I employed them in erecting a
pyramid of stones on the summit of the Red Hill. It is twenty-one feet at
the base, and eighteen feet high, and bears 329 degrees from the camp, or
31 degrees to the west of north. I little thought when I was engaged in
that work, that I was erecting Mr. Poole's monument, but so it was, that
rude structure looks over his lonely grave, and will stand for ages as a
record of all we suffered in the dreary region to which we were so long
confined.

The months of May and June, and the first and second weeks of July passed
over our heads, yet there was no indication of a change of weather. It
had been bitterly cold during parts of this period, the thermometer
having descended to 24 degrees; thus making the difference between the
extremes of summer heat and winter's cold no less than 133 degrees.

About the middle of June I had the drays put into serviceable condition,
the wheels wedged up, and every thing prepared for moving away.

Anxious to take every measure to prevent unnecessary delay, when the day
of liberation should arrive, I had sent Mr. Stuart and Mr. Piesse, with a
party of chainers, to measure along the line on which I intended to move
when the Depot was broken up. I had determined, as I have elsewhere
informed the reader, to penetrate to the westward, in the hope of finding
Lake Torrens connected with some more extensive and more central body of
water; and I thought it would be satisfactory to ascertain, as nearly as
possible, the distance of that basin from the Darling, and in so do