f our last year's encampment, which had suffered no alteration,
except what had been occasioned by a rapid vegetation: a sterculia, the
stem of which had served as one of the props of our mess-tent, and to
which we had nailed a sheet of copper with an inscription, was
considerably grown; and the gum had oozed out in such profusion where the
nails had pierced the bark that it had forced one corner of the copper
off.

The large gouty-stemmed tree on which the Mermaid's name had been carved
in deep indented characters remained without any alteration, and seemed
likely to bear the marks of our visit longer than any other memento we
had left.

The sensations experienced at revisiting a place which had so seasonably
afforded us a friendly shelter and such unlooked-for convenience for our
purposes, can only be estimated by those who have experienced them; and
it is only to strangers to such feelings that it will appear ridiculous
to say, that even the nail to which our thermometer had been suspended,
was the subject of pleasurable recognition.

We then bent our steps to the water-gully, but, to our mortification, it
was quite dried up, and exhibited no vestige of its having contained any
for some time. From the more luxuriant and verdant appearance of the
trees and grass than the country hereabout assumed last year, when the
water was abundant, we had felt assured of finding it and therefore our
disappointment was the greater.

July 24.

After another unsuccessful search in the bight, to the eastward of
Careening Bay, in which we fruitlessly examined a gully that Mr.
Cunningham informed me had last year produced a considerable stream, we
gave up all hopes of success here, and directed our attention to the
cascade of Prince Regent's River; which we entered the next afternoon,
with the wind and tide in our favour, and at sunset reached an anchorage
at the bottom of St. George's Basin, a mile and a half to the northward
of the islet that lies off the inner entrance of the river, in seven
fathoms muddy sand.

July 26.

The following morning at half-past four o'clock Mr. Montgomery
accompanied me in the whale-boat to visit the cascade; we reached it at
nine o'clock and found the water, to our inexpressible satisfaction,
falling abundantly.

While the boat's crew rested and filled their baricas, I ascended the
rocks over which the water was falling and was surprised to find its
height had been so underrated when we passed