shall merely review the subject, in order to connect subsequent
events with my previous observations, and to give the reader a full idea
of that which struck me to be the case on a close and anxious
investigation of the country from mountain to lowland. I returned from the
Macquarie with doubts on my mind as to the ultimate direction to which the
waters of the Darling river might ultimately flow; for, with regard to
every other point, the question was, I considered, wholly decided. But,
with regard to that singular stream, I was, from the little knowledge I
had obtained, puzzled as to its actual course; and I thought it as likely
that it might turn into the heart of the interior, as that it would make
to the south. It had not, however, escaped my notice, that the northern
rivers turned more abruptly southward (after gaining a certain distance
from the base of the ranges) than the more southern streams: near the
junction of the Castlereagh with the Darling especially, the number of
large creeks joining the first river from the north, led me to conclude
that there was at that particular spot a rapid fall of country to the
south.

The first thing that strengthened in my mind this half-formed opinion, was
the fall of the Lachlan into the Morumbidgee. I had been told that
Australia was a basin; that an unbroken range of hills lined its coasts,
the internal rivers of which fell into its centre, and contributed to the
formation of an inland sea; I was not therefore prepared to find a break
in the chain--a gap as it were for the escape of these waters to the
coast.

Subsequently to our entrance into the Murray, the remarkable efforts of
that river to maintain a southerly course were observed even by the men,
and the singular runs it made to the south, when unchecked by high lands,
clearly evinced its natural tendency to flow in that direction.

Had we found ourselves at an elevation above the bed of the Darling when
we reached the junction of the principal tributary with the Murray, I
should still have had doubts on my mind as to the identity of that
tributary with the first-mentioned river; but considering the trifling
elevation of the Darling above the sea, and that the junction was still
less elevated above it, I cannot bring myself to believe that the former
alters its course. It is not, however, on this simple geographical
principle that I have built my conclusions; other corroborative
circumstances have tended also to