Broad and striking as were the features of the landscape over which the
eye wandered from the summit of this hill, I have much difficulty in
describing them.

Immediately beneath was the low region from which we had just ascended,
occupying the line of the horizon from the north-east point, southwards,
round to the west. Southward, and for some degrees on either side, a fine
dark line met the sky; but to the north-east and south-west was a
boundless extent of earthy plain. Here and there a solitary clump of
trees appeared, and on the plain, at the distance of a mile to the
eastward, were two moving specks, in the shape of native women gathering
roots, but they saw us not, neither did we disturb them,--their presence
indicated that even these gloomy and forbidding regions were not
altogether uninhabited.

As the reader will, I have no doubt, remember, the sandy ridges on the
S.E. side of the Desert were running at an angle of about 18 degrees to
the west of north, having gradually changed from the original direction
of about 6 degrees to the eastward of that point. I myself had marked
this gradual change with great interest, because it was strongly
corroborative of my views as to the course the current I have supposed to
have swept over the central parts of the continent must have taken, i. e.
a course at right angles to the ridges. It is a remarkable fact that
here, on the northern side of the Desert, and after an open interval of
more than 50 miles, the same sand ridges should occur, running in
parallel lines at the same angle as before, into the very heart of the
interior, as if they absolutely were never to terminate. Here, on both
sides of us, to the eastward and to the westward, they followed each
other like the waves of the sea in endless succession, suddenly
terminating as I have already observed on the vast plain into which they
ran. What, I will ask, was I to conclude from these facts?--that the
winds had formed these remarkable accumulations of sand, as straight as
an arrow lying on the ground without a break in them for more than ninety
miles at a stretch, and which we had already followed up for hundreds of
miles, that is to say across six degrees of latitude? No! winds may
indeed have assisted in shaping their outlines, but I cannot think, that
these constituted the originating cause of their formation. They exhibit
a regularity that water alone could have given, and to water, I believe,
they plainly ow