," adds Captain Grey, "were of a more melancholy
character, for I feared that the days of some of the light-hearted group
were already numbered, and would soon be brought to a close. Amid such
scenes and thoughts we were swept along, while this unknown coast, which
so many had anxiously yet vainly wished to see, passed before our eyes
like a dream, and ere many more years have hurried by, it is possible
that the recollection of this day may be as such to me."

Among the wonders of Nature to be met with in the Australian bush, the
large rivers occasionally dried up to their very lowest depth by the
extreme drought, are very remarkable. Few natural objects can equal in
beauty and utility a river in its proper state,--

"Though deep, yet clear; though gentle, yet not dull;
Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full;"

but few can exceed in terror and destruction a large river in time of
flood; while nothing, surely, can surpass in horror and desolation the
same object when its stream is wasted, its waters disappeared, its
usefulness and beauty alike gone. This spectacle is, fortunately, but
rarely seen, except in Australia, and even there only after very dry
seasons. One river seen in this state consisted of several channels or
beds, divided from each other by long strips of land, which in times of
flood become islands; the main channel was about 270 yards in breadth,
and the height of its bank was about fifteen feet. After the exploring
party had passed the highest point in the channel to which the tide
flowed from the sea, this huge river bed was perfectly dry, and looked
the most mournful, deserted spot imaginable. Occasionally water-holes
were found eighteen or twenty feet in depth, and it is from these alone
that travellers have been enabled to satisfy their thirst in crossing
over the unexplored parts of the bush, where no water could elsewhere be
obtained. Still, notwithstanding the extreme drought by which they were
surrounded, the strangers could see by the remaining drift wood, which
had been washed high up into the neighbouring trees, what rapid and
overpowering currents sometimes swept along the now dry channel.

On another occasion the same singular object is powerfully described,
and the feelings of men, who had long been in need of water, at
beholding a sight like this can scarcely be imagined. Beneath them lay
the dry bed of a large river, its depth at this point being between
forty and fifty