d being based upon a stiff, tenacious clay,
impervious to water. With the exception of a few salsolae and atriplex,
the plains were exceedingly bare, and had innumerable patches of water
over them, not more than two or three inches deep. At intervals pure sand
hills occurred, on which there were a few stunted casuarina and mimosae,
but a good deal of grass and thousands of young plants already springing
up. As the ground was still very soft, I should not have moved on the
20th, but was anxious to push on. Early in the day, and at less than 18
miles from the hills, we encountered the sandy ridges, and found the pull
over them much worse than over the flats. The wheels of the drays sank
deep into the ground, and in straining to get them clear we broke seven
yokes. Two flights of swans, and a small flight of ducks, passed over our
heads at dusk, coming from the W.N.W. The brushes were full of the
Calodera, but being very wild we could not procure a specimen.

The chainers had no difficulty in keeping pace with us, and on the 26th
we found ourselves in lat. 29 degrees 6 minutes, having then chained 61
miles on a bearing of 55 degrees to the west of north, as originally
determined upon. Finding that I had thus passed to the south-west of the
grassy plain, I halted, and rode with Flood to the eastward; when at
seven miles we descended into it, and finding that there was an abundance
of water in the creek (the channel we had before noticed), I returned to
Mr. Browne; but as it was late in the afternoon when we regained the
tents, we did not move that evening, and the succeeding day being Sunday
we also remained stationary. We had halted close to one of those clear
patches on which the rain water lodges, but it had dried up, and there
was only a little for our use in a small gutter not far distant. Whilst
we were here encamped a little jerboa was chased by the dogs into a hole
close to the drays; which, with four others, we succeeded in capturing,
by digging for them. This beautiful little animal burrows in the ground
like a mouse, but their habitations have several passages, leading
straight, like the radii of a circle, to a common centre, to which a
shaft is sunk from above, so that there is a complete circulation of air
along the whole. We fed our little captives on oats, on which they
thrived, and became exceedingly tame. They generally huddled together in
a corner of their box, but, when darting from one side to the other, t