"A reflection arose to my mind, on examining these decaying vestiges of a former expedition, whether I should be more fortunate than the leader of it, and how far I should be enabled to penetrate beyond the point which had conquered his perseverance. Only a week before I left Sydney I had followed Mr. Oxley to the tomb. A man of uncommon quickness and of great ability. The task of following up his discoveries was not less enviable than arduous; but, arrived at that point at which his journey may be said to have terminated and mine only to commence, I knew not how soon I should be obliged, like him, to retreat from the marshes and exhalations of so depressed a country. My eye turned instinctively to the north-west, and the view extended over an apparently endless forest. I could trace the river line of trees by their superior height, but saw no appearance of reeds save the few that grew on the banks of the stream."

Satisfied, after consultation with his companion Hume, that there was no obstacle to their onward march, they left their position, intending, as Sturt says, "to close with the marshes."

The night of the first day found them camped amongst the reeds, which they came upon sooner than they expected, and the next day they halted for the purpose of preparing the dispatches for the Governor. On the morning of the 26th, the journey was resumed, the two messengers leaving for Bathurst, the rest proceeding onward until checked by finding themselves in the great body of the marsh, which spread in boundless extent around them.

"It was evidently," says the leader, "lower than the ground on which we stood; we had, therefore, a complete view of the whole expanse, and there was a dreariness and desolation pervading the scene which strengthened as we gazed upon it."

Under the circumstances, an advance with the main body of the party was considered unwise, and it was determined to launch the boat, and try and follow the course of the river, whilst a simultaneous attempt was made to penetrate the reed bed to the north. Accordingly Sturt, with two men, started in the boat, and Hume and two more struck north.

Sturt's boating expedition came very quickly to a close. In the afternoon of the day he started:—

" . . . the channel which had promised so well, without any change in its breadth or depth, ceased altogether, and while we were yet lost in astonishment at so abrupt a termination of it the boat grounded."

All search was fruitless, and mysteriously and completely baffled as Oxley had been, so was his successor, and there was nothing for it but to return to camp.

Hume had been more successful. He reported finding a serpentine sheet of water to the northward, which he did not doubt was the channel of the river. He had pushed on, but was checked by another of the seemingly inevitable marshes.

On the 28th the camp was shifted to this lagoon, and the boat was launched once more; without result. The new-found channel was soon lost in reeds and shallows. Forced to halt again, Hume went to the north-east to scout, and Sturt went north-west, each accompanied, as before, by two men. They left the camp on the last day of the year.

After sunset on the first day, Sturt struck a creek of considerable size leading northerly, having good water in its bed. The next day, after passing through alternate plain and brush for eighteen miles, a second creek was found, inferior to the first both in size and the quality of the water; it too ran northerly. Crossing this creek, after a short halt, they travelled through stony ridges and open forest, and at night camped on the edge of a waterless plain, after a hot and thirsty ride; here one of the men, noticing the flight of a pigeon, found a small puddle of rain water that just sufficed them. Next day, the country steadily improving in appearance, they made west by south for an isolated mountain with perpendicular sides, from the top of which Sturt trusted to see something hopeful ahead. He was disappointed, the country was monotonous and level, and no sign of a river could be seen. They camped that night at a small swamp, and next morning Sturt turned back, like Oxley, coming to the conclusion that:—

"Yet upon the whole, the space I traversed is unlikely to become the haunt of civilised man, or will become so in isolated spots, as a chain of connection to a more fertile country; if such a country exist to the westward."

Hume had not returned when the party reached the main camp on the 5th of January; the next day he made his appearance. He reported having travelled, on various courses, about thirty miles N.N.W. over an indifferent country. He had anticipated meeting with the Castlereagh, but had been forced to conclude that that river had taken a more northerly course than Mr. Oxley had supposed. He went westward, and across fine far-stretching plains, but saw no sign of the Macquarie River having re-formed, crossing nothing but small 'reeks or chains of ponds.

Most of the men, including Hume, complaining of sickness, he camp was shifted four miles to the north, on to a chain of ponds reported by Hume. This creek they followed down, when it disappointed them by disappearing in the marsh. Without water, they continued skirting the low country until fatigue compelled them to stop, when, by digging shallow wells in the reeds, they obtained a small supply. From here they made their way by a different route to the hill that had terminated Sturt's late trip, and which he had christened Oxley's Tableland. Here they rested a few days, and Sturt and Hume, with two men, made another excursion westward, but without result.

Their only resource now was to make north to a creek that they had followed down on their way to Oxley's tableland, and see where it would lead them.

On the 31st January they came upon this creek, which was called by them New Year's Creek, now the Bogan, and the next day they suddenly found themselves on the brink of a noble river:—

"The party drew up upon a bank that was from forty to forty-five feet above the level of the stream. The channel of the river was from seventy to eighty yards broad, and enclosed an unbroken sheet of water, evidently very deep, and literally covered with pelicans and other wild fowl. Our surprise and delight may better be imagined than described. Our difficulties seemed to be at an end, for here was a river that promised to reward all our exertions, and which appeared every moment to increase in importance to our imaginations. Coming from the N.E. and flowing to the S.W., it had a capacity of channel that proved that we were as far from its source as from its termination. The paths of the natives on either side of it were like trodden roads, and the trees that overhung it were of beautiful and gigantic growth.

"The banks were too precipitous to 'allow of our watering the cattle, but the men descended eagerly to quench their thirst, which a powerful sun had contributed to increase; nor shall I ever forget the cry of amazement that followed their doing so, or the looks of terror and disappointment with which they called out to inform me that the water was so salt as to be unfit to drink. This was indeed too true. On tasting it, I found it extremely nauseous, and strongly impregnated with salt, being apparently a mixture of sea and fresh water. . . Our hopes were annihilated at the moment of their apparent realisation. The cup of joy was dashed out of our hands before we had time to raise it to our lips."

Finding fresh feed lower down the river, the party halted for the benefit of the cattle, who, unable to drink the water, soaked their bodies in it. Meantime, although the tracks of the natives were abundant, they looked in vain for any of them. Fortunately, that night Hume found a pond of fresh water, and the party were refreshed once more. The phenomena of the salt river was puzzling to Sturt, though too familiar now to excite wonder; the long continued drought having lowered the river so that the brine springs in the banks preponderated over the fresh water, was of course the explanation, and it is a common characteristic of inland watercourses. The size of the river and the saltness of its water, however, partly convinced Sturt that he was near its confluence with an inland sea; so for six days they moved slowly down the river, finding, however, no change in its formation, until the discovery of saline springs in the bank convinced the leader that the saltness was of local origin.

Leaving the party encamped at a small pool of fresh water, Sturt and Hume pushed ahead to look for more, but without success. Before leaving they were startled, one afternoon, by a loud report like a distant cannon, for which they could in noway account, as the sky was clear and without a cloud. [These strange reports have since been frequently heard, often at the same moment, at places more than a hundred miles apart. The cause is generally ascribed to atmospheric disturbances.]

The advance was now checked, no fresh water could be found on ahead, and their animals were weak and exhausted. Sturt christened the river the Darling, and gave the order to retreat.

As they again approached Mount Harris on the Macquarie, where they expected to find a relief party with fresh supplies, fears began to be entertained regarding the safety of those who might be awaiting them at the depot. The reed beds were in flames in all parts, and the few natives they met displayed a guilty timidity, and one was observed with a jacket in his possession. Their fears were, however, fortunately vain, the natives had made one attempt to surprise the camp, but it had been frustrated, and the relief party had now been some three weeks awaiting the return of the explorers.

Sturt rested for some days, during which time Hume made a short western trip.. to the south of the marsh land. He reported that for thirty miles the country was superior to anything they had yet seen, and exceedingly well watered; beyond that distance the plains and brush of the remote interior again resumed their sway.

On the 7th March the party struck camp and made for the Castlereagh, the relief going back to Bathurst. On the 10th they reached the Castlereagh, and found it apparently without a drop of water in its bed. From here downwards the old harassing hunt for water commenced once more, and as they descended the river they were further puzzled by the intricate windings of its course and the number of channels that intersected the depressed country they were travelling through. On the 29th they again struck the Darling, ninety miles above the spot where they had discovered it:

"This singular river still preserved its character so strikingly that it was impossible not to have recognised it in a moment. The same steep banks and lofty timber, the same deep reaches, alive with fish, were here visible as when we left it. A hope naturally arose to our minds, that if it was unchanged in other respects, it might have lost the saltness that rendered its waters unfit for use; but in this we were disappointed-even its waters continued the same."

Fortunately the adventurers were not this time in such unhappy straits for water as before, so that the disappointment was less intense. Knowing what they might expect if they followed the Darling down south, the party at once halted. It was evident that to the east and north-east, the rigorous drought had put its mark on the land, from the fact that large bodies of natives driven in from that direction were congregated round the few permanent waters left. A reconnoitring expedition across the Darling to the N.W. was accordingly determined on, to see if any advance into the interior was possible, and after a camp had been formed Sturt and Hume started on the quest. No encouragement to proceed resulted. By four p.m. they found themselves on a plain that stretched far away and bounded the horizon.

"It was dismally brown, a few trees only served to mark the distance. Up one of the highest I sent Hopkins on, who reported that he could not see the end of it, and that all around looked blank and desolate. It is a singular fact that during the whole day we had not seen a drop of water or a blade of grass.

"To have stopped where we were would, therefore, have been impossible; to have advanced would probably have been ruin. Had there been one favourable circumstance to have encouraged me with the hope of success I would have proceeded. Had we picked up a stone, as indicating our approach to high land, I would have gone on; or had there been a break in the country, or even a change in the vegetation; but we had left all traces of the natives behind us, and this seemed a desert they never entered—that not even a bird inhabited. I could not encourage a hope of success, and therefore gave up the point, not from want of means, but a conviction of the inutility of any further efforts. If there is any blame to be attached to the measure it is I who am in fault; but none who had not like me traversed the interior at such a season would believe the state of the country over which I had wandered. During the short interval I had been out, I had seen rivers cease to flow before me and sheets of water disappear, and had it not been for a merciful Providence should, ere reaching the Darling, have been overwhelmed by misfortune.

"I am giving no false picture of the reality. So long had the drought continued that the vegetable kingdom was almost annihilated, and minor vegetation had disappeared."

Once more the order to retreat from the inhospitable Darling was given, and the weary march home recommenced. On their way they traced and followed a defined channel, or depression, formerly crossed by Hume, and ascertained it to be the outflow of the Macquarie Marshes. On the 7th of April, 1829, they reached Mount Harris.

The mystery of the Macquarie was now, to a certain extent, cleared up, but there still remained another riddle to solve in the course and outlet of the Darling. Sturt, the discoverer of this river, was destined to find the answer to this problem as well.

We have now traced the gradual extension of exploration to the westward, and seen a river system growing up, as it were, piece by piece, as the result of these expeditions; it may, therefore, be as well to continue to follow up Captain Sturt's expeditions, and note how the Murray and its tributary streams were gradually elaborated, before touching upon events at this time occurring afar on the south-west coast of the continent.

The desire to ascertain the course of the Darling naturally became a subject of great interest so soon as the result of Captain Sturt's expedition was known; and the Macquarie and Lachlan rivers having failed to afford a means of reaching the interior, it was determined to try the Morumbidgee. The fact that this river derived its supply from the highest known mountains, and was independent, to a large extent, of the periodical rainfall, was a great inducement to hope for success.

Almost exactly a year after he had started on his journey down the Macquarie, Captain Sturt left Sydney, on his Morumbidgee expedition, on the 3rd of November, 1829.

Hume, was not, on this occasion, able to accompany the party, his own affairs on his farm needing his attention; doubtless in spirit he was often with them, and it would have been but fitting had the discoverer of the Murray or Hume, been one of the party to first trace its downward course. In Hume's place went George M'Leay, the son of the then Colonial Secretary, Alexander M'Leay; with them also went Harris, Hopkinson, and Fraser, members of the Macquarie expedition,

To our modern eyes the appearance of the troop that marched out of Sydney, early that summer morning, would have looked strange indeed.

"At a quarter before seven the party filed through the turnpike gate, and thus commenced its journey with the greatest regularity. I have the scene even at this distance of time, vividly impressed upon my mind, and I have no doubt the kind friend who was with me on the occasion bears it as strongly on his recollection. My servant Harris, who had shared my wanderings, and had continued in my service for eighteen years, led the advance with his companion Hopkinson; nearly abreast of them the eccentric Frazer stalked along, wholly lost in thought. The two former had laid aside their military habits, and had substituted the broad-brimmed hat, and the bushman's dress in their place, but it was impossible to guess how Frazer intended to protect himself from the heat or damp, so little were his habiliments suited for the occasion. He had his gun over his shoulder, and his double shot belt as full as it could be of shot, although there was not a chance of his expending a grain during the day. Some dogs Mr. Maxwell had kindly sent me followed close at his heels, as if they knew his interest in them, and they really seemed as if they were aware that they were about to exchange their late confinement for the freedom of the woods. The whole of these formed a kind of advanced guard. At some distance in the rear the drays moved slowly along, on one of which rode the black boy; Robert Harris, whom I had appointed to superintend the animals generally, kept his place near the horses, and the heavy Clayton, my carpenter, brought up the rear."

It will be needless to follow the progress of the party through the settled districts that now extended to the banks of the Morumbidgee: on the 27th, we find them preparing to start from Mr. Whaby's station, the last outpost of civilization. From thence they followed the river down, maintaining constant and friendly intercourse with the natives on the banks. For some time they passed through rich available country, and at one point they made a slight excursion to the north to connect with Oxley's most southerly limit; although they did not actually verify it, Sturt was of the opinion that they were within at least twenty miles of the range seen by Oxley. Still following the river they now found its course leading them amongst the plains and flat country with which they were so well acquainted, and naturally travelled in the constant dread of the stream conducting them to the lame and impotent conclusions of the Macquarie and Lachlan.

"OUR ROUTE WAS OVER AS MELANCHOLY A TRACT AS EVER WAS TRAVELLED. THE PLAINS TO THE N. AND N.W. BOUNDED THE HORIZON; NOT A TREE OF ANY KIND WAS VISIBLE UPON THEM. IT WAS EQUALLY OPEN TO THE SOUTH, AND IT APPEARED AS IF THE RIVER WAS DECOYING US INTO A DESERT, THERE TO LEAVE US IN DIFFICULTY AND IN DISTRESS."

Sturt now was constantly haunted with the thought of once more finding himself baffled and perplexed in some vast region of flooded country, without a defined system of channels. Every time he looked at the river he imagined that it had fallen off in appearance, feeling certain that the flooded spaces over which he was travelling would soon be succeeded by a country overgrown with reeds. The flats of polygonum stretched away to the N.W., and to the S., and the soil itself bore testimony to its flooded origin. Some natives here met with spoke of the COLARE, a name which Sturt had beard before, and which he took to mean the Lachlan, from the direction in which the blacks pointed. These men indicated that they were but one day's journey from it. Sturt and M'Leay, therefore, rode to the north to examine the country; they found a creek of considerable size, and from its appearance and the nature of the surrounding flats, deemed it to be a similar channel from the Lachlan marshes to the Morumbidgee, as the one Sturt and Hume had formerly noticed to the north, leading from the great marsh of the Macquarie to the Darling. In point of fact they actually crossed the Lachlan, and went some distance beyond it, passing close to Oxley's lowest camp, as the natives afterwards testified to Major Mitchell.

The extract from the Major's journal bearing on the subject runs thus:—

"The natives further informed me that three men on horseback, who had canoes (boats) on the Murrumbidgee, had visited the Lachlan thereabouts since, and that after crossing it, and going a little way beyond, they had returned."

Sturt mentioned seeing the fires of the natives during this trip, but he did not see them, although it was evident that they had a good look at him.

On the 26th of December, it seemed that their gloomiest hopes were to be realised. Traversing plains like those described before, Sturt says:—

"The wheels of the drays sank up to their axle-trees, and the horses above their fetlocks at every step. The fields of polygonum spread on every side of us, like a dark sea, and the only green object within range of our vision was the river line of trees. In several instances the force of both teams was put to one dray, to extricate it from the bed into which it had sunk, and the labour was considerably increased from the nature of the weather. The wind was blowing as if through a furnace, from the N.N.E., and the dust was flying in clouds, so as to render it almost suffocating to remain exposed to it. This was the only occasion upon which we felt the hot winds in the interior. We were, about noon, endeavouring to gain a point of a wood at which I expected to come upon the river again, but it was impossible for the teams to reach it without assistance. I therefore sent M'Leay forward with orders to unload the pack animals as soon as he should make the river, and send them back to help the teams. He had scarcely been separated from me twenty minutes, when one of the men came galloping back to inform me that no river was to be found—that the country beyond the woods was covered with reeds as far as the eye could reach, and that Mr. M'Leay had sent him back for instructions. This intelligence stunned me for a moment or two, and I am sure its effect upon the men was very great. They had unexpectedly arrived at a part of the interior similar to one they held in dread, and conjured up a thousand difficulties and privations. I desired the man to recall Mr. M'Leay; and, after gaining the wood, moved outside of it at right angles to my former course, and reached the river, after a day of severe toil and exposure at half-past five. The country, indeed, bore every resemblance to that around the marshes of the Macquarie, but I was too weary to make any further effort; indeed it was too late for one to undertake anything until the morning."

The following day, accompanied by his friend, Sturt proceeded to examine the river. He found it still running strong, without any sign of diminution in its flow, but the reedy flats were so dense and thick that no passage for the teams was practicable. At noon the leader halted, and announced his intention of returning to camp. He had come to the determination to construct the whaleboat he had with him in sections, to send the teams back, and, with six men and Mr. M'Leay, to start down the river, and follow it wherever it went; whether ever to return again or not was for the future to determine.

Clayton, the carpenter, was at once set to work upon the boat, or boats, for a tree was felled, a sawpit rigged up, and a small boat half the size of the whaleboat built. Everybody worked hard, and in seven days the boats were afloat, moored alongside a temporary wharf, ready for loading. Six men were then chosen to form the crew, who were about to undertake one of the most eventful and important voyages in Australia's history. They were Clayton, the carpenter, Mulholland and Macnamee, the three soldiers, Harris, Hopkinson and Fraser, the leader, and M'Leay—eight in all. The remainder of the party, under Robert Harris, were to remain stationary one week, in case of accident, then to proceed to Goulburn Plains and await instructions from Sydney.

On the 7th of January, 1830, the voyagers started, towing the smaller boat, the men all in high spirits at the wide prospect of adventure before them.

Going with the stream they made rapid progress, using only two oars, but the first day did not suffice to carry them clear of the reeds, in fact, at night when they landed to camp, they could scarcely find room to pitch their tents. On the second day, an accident happened to the skiff they were towing; she struck on a log, and immediately sank with all the valuable cargo she carried. Two days were spent in recovering the things, as the boat had gone down in twelve feet of water, and during the time they were so employed, the blacks robbed the camp of many articles.

Once more on the move, they found the river still winding its way through a flat expanse of reeds, and threatening to end as the other rivers had done. On the afternoon of the next day a change for the better took place; the reeds on both sides of the river terminated, and the country became more elevated, and bore the appearance of open forest pasture land; a tributary creek of considerable size joined the river from the S.E., and the spirits of the voyagers rose again. More tributaries now came in from the south-east, and the dangers of navigation increased, the river being full of snags and fallen timber, and the utmost care had to be used to keep the boat clear. On the second day of this distressing work, they were destined to meet with a surprise.

"About one we again started. The men looked anxiously ahead, for the singular change in the river had impressed on them the idea that we were approaching its termination, or near some adventure. On a sudden the river took a general southern direction, but, in its tortuous course, swept round to every point of the compass with the greatest irregularity. We were carried at a fearful rate down its gloomy and contracted banks, and in such a moment of excitement, had little time to pay attention to the country through which we were passing. It was, however, observed that chalybeate springs were numerous close to the water's edge. At three p.m., Hopkinson called out that we were approaching a junction, and in less than a minute afterwards we were hurried into a broad and noble river.

"It is impossible to describe the effect of so instantaneous a change upon us. The boats were allowed to drift along at pleasure, and such was the force with which we had been shot out of the Morumbidgee, that we were carried nearly to the bank opposite its embouchure, whilst we continued to gaze in silent astonishment on the capacious channel we had entered; and when we looked for that by which we had been led into it, we could hardly believe that the insignificant gap that presented itself to us was indeed the termination of the beautiful and noble stream whose course we had thus successfully followed."

Sturt had now succeeded beyond his hopes—his bold adventure had been rewarded even sooner than he could have expected. He felt assured that at last he floated on the stream destined to bear him to the sea. The key to the river system of the south-east portion of the continent was in his grasp, and all former fallacies and fanciful theories were answered for good. The voyage down the Murray, as this river was named, after Sir George Murray, then the bead of the Colonial Department, now continued free from some of the difficulties that had beset them in the Morumbidgee. The natives again made their appearance, and were constantly seen every day, some betraying great timidity, others appearing more curious than frightened. Four of these natives accompanied them for two days, during which time the explorers narrowly suffered wreck in a rapid in the river.

They now approached the confluence of the Darling, although of course they were not then able to verify the supposition that it was their old friend, and at this point one of the most singular adventures ever narrated in the intercourse with native tribes happened.

The wind was fair, and with the sail set, the boat was making rapid way when, at the termination of a long reach, they observed a line of magnificent trees, of green and dense foliage. A large number of blacks were here assembled, and apparently with no friendly intentions, armed, painted, and shouting defiance. Anxious to avert hostilities, Sturt steered straight for them, thinking to make friends; but when almost too close to avoid a meeting, he could see that the matter was serious. The blacks had their spears poised for throwing, and their women were behind with a fresh supply. The sail was lowered and the helm put about, and the boat passed down the stream, the natives running along the bank, keeping pace with them, shouting and attempting to take aim.

To add to their danger the river shoaled rapidly, and a sandspit appeared ahead, projecting nearly two thirds of the way across the channel, and on this spit the blacks now gathered with tremendous uproar, evidently determined to make an assault on the boat as she ran the gauntlet through the narrow passage. Amongst the four blacks who had accompanied them for two days was one of superior personal strength and stature. These men had left the camp of the whites the night before, and it was believing in their presence in the crowd before them that led Sturt to disregard the hostile demonstrations.

A battle now seemed inevitable. Arms were distributed to the crew, and orders given how to act when the emergency arose.

We will let Sturt tell his own story:—

"The men assured me they would follow my instructions, and thus prepared, having already lowered the sail, we drifted onwards with the current. As we neared the sand-bank, I stood up and made signs to the natives to desist, but without success. I took up my gun, therefore, and cocking it, had already brought it down to a level; a few seconds more would have closed the life of the nearest savage. The distance was too trifling for me to doubt the fatal effects of the discharge; for I was determined to take deadly aim, in hopes that the fall of one man might save the lives of many. But at the very moment when my hand was on the trigger, and my eye was along the barrel, my purpose was checked by M'Leay, who called to me that another party of blacks had made their appearance upon the left bank of the river. Turning round, I observed four men at the top of their speed. The foremost of them, as soon as he got ahead of the boat, threw himself from a considerable height into the water. He struggled across the channel to the sandbank, and in an incredibly short space of time stood in front of the savage, against whom my aim had been directed. Seizing him by the throat, he pushed him backwards, and forcing all who were in the water upon the bank, he trod its margin with a vehemence and an agitation that were exceedingly striking. At one moment pointing to the boat, at another shaking his clenched hand in the faces of the most forward, and stamping with passion on the sand; his voice, that was at first distinct, was lost in hoarse murmurs. Two of the four natives remained on the left bank of the river, the third followed his leader (who proved to be the remarkable savage I have previously noticed) to the scene of action. The reader will imagine our feelings on this occasion; it is impossible to describe them. We were so wholly lost in interest at the scene that was passing, that the boat was allowed to drift at pleasure.

"We were again aroused to action by the boat suddenly striking upon a shoal, which reached from one side of the river to the other. To jump out and push her into deep water was but the work of a moment with the men, and it was just as she floated again that our attention was withdrawn to a new and beautiful stream, coming apparently from the north. . . . A party of about seventy blacks were upon the right bank of the newly discovered river, and I thought that by landing amongst them I might make a diversion in favour of our late guest, and in this I succeeded. The blacks no sooner observed that we had landed than curiosity took the place of anger. All wrangling ceased, and they came swimming over to us like a parcels of seals . . . It was not until after we had returned to the boat, and had surveyed the multitude on the sloping bank above us that we became fully aware of the extent of our danger, and of the almost miraculous intervention of Providence in our favour. There could not have been less than six hundred natives upon that blackened sward."

After presenting their friend who had acted so effectively on their behalf, and whose energetic conduct and prompt interference to preserve peace is unparalleled in native annals, with suitable gifts and refusing them to the other chiefs, the boat's crew proceeded to examine the new river they had discovered at such a critical moment.

Pulling easily up for a short distance they found it preserved a breadth of one hundred yards, and a depth of rather more than twelve feet, The banks were sloping and grassy, crowned with fine trees, and the men exclaimed that they had got into an English river.

To Sturt himself the moment was a supreme one; was it, or was it not that mysterious Darling, whose course through the far interior had been a subject of speculation ever since its discovery? He felt sure that it was.

"An irresistible conviction impressed me that we were now sailing on the bosom of that very stream from whose banks I had been twice forced to retire. I directed the Union jack to be hoisted, and giving way to our satisfaction we all stood up in the boat and gave three distinct cheers. It was an English feeling, an ebullition, an overflow, which I am ready to admit that our circumstances and situation will alone excuse. The eve of every native had been fixed upon that noble flag, at all times a beautiful object, and to them a novel one, as it waved over us in the heart of the desert. They had until that moment been particularly loquacious, but the sight of that flag and the sound of our voices hushed the tumult, and while they were still lost in astonishment, the boat's head was turned, the sail was sheeted home, both wind and current were in our favour, and we vanished from them with a rapidity that surprised even ourselves, and which precluded every hope of the most adventurous among them to keep up with us."

Once Pore down the now united streams of the Murray and the Darling the party made rapid progress, landing occasionally to inspect the country, but finding always a boundless flat on either side of them.

Provisions now began to get scarce with them, the barrels of salt pork that had been in the skiff when she sank in the Morumbidgee had their contents damaged by the admission of the fresh water. The fish, though abundant, were more than unattractive to their palates, and the men took no trouble to set the night lines. The strictest economy had, therefore, to become the order of the day. The skiff being only a drag to them, she was broken up, and burnt for the sake of the nails and iron-work.

On the 24th of January, the whale-boat continued its voyage alone, and the record from day to day was only broken by their intercourse with the different tribes, with whom a regular system of communication was now established. Deputies were sent ahead, from one tribe to another, to prepare them for the visit of the strangers. These deputies, by cutting off the numerous bends of the river, were enabled to travel much quicker than did Sturt, frequently doing easily in one day what it took the boat two to accomplish. Their black friends were, however, becoming rather a nuisance; little or no information could be obtained from them, and the constant handling and embracing, which they had from policy to submit to, became horribly distasteful to all of them, particularly as Sturt describes all the tribes he met with as being beyond the average filthily dirty, and eaten up with skin diseases.

On the 25th, the wanderers thought they sighted a range to the N.W., and the blacks confirmed it, pointing in that direction when Hopkinson piled up some clay in imitation of mountains.

On the 29th, the leader calculated that they were still one hundred and fifteen miles from the coast, and as they had been now twenty-two days on the river, their return began to be a matter for serious thought. From what he saw of the country, Sturt imagined that it was, for the most part, barren and sandy, and would never be utilised. But, of course, he had little or no opportunities, travelling as he did, of forming a correct judgment.

The cliffs on the river bank now showed fossilized sea shells in their strata; chains of hills, too, became visible, and one of the natives, [This old native, after the settlement of the country, was shot in cold blood by one of the South Australian police.] an old man who had taken a strange fancy to Hopkinson, described the roaring of the sea and the height of the waves, showing that he had visited the coast. None, it may be certain, were more glad than the leader to hear of their proximity, for his thoughts were always busy with the failing condition of his men, and the accumulating difficulties of his return.

True, it had been partly arranged that a vessel should proceed to the south coast, but Sturt had little hope of meeting her, even if one had been sent. The frequent bends in the river greatly delayed their advance, but they were cheered by the flight of sea-gulls over their heads. The river, too, widened day after day, and a constant strong wind from the S.W., raised a chopping sea that almost stopped their way; the blacks they met all assured them that the ocean was at hand. On the 9th February, Sturt landing to examine the country, saw before him the lake that terminated the Murray. He had reached his goal, thirty-three days after separating from his party, at the Morumbidgee. Crossing the lake the little band landed on the southern shore, and ascertained that the communication between it and the sea was impracticable on account of its extreme shallowness; they found their position to be in Encounter Bay, east of Spencer's Gulf, and from what they saw it was evident that no ship could enter it during the prevalence of the S.W. winds. All hope of a safe return centred in themselves. The thunder of the surf, that they had so longed for, brought no message of succour, but rather warned the lonely men to hasten back, while yet some strength remained to them; and above all they were surrounded by hostile blacks. Sturt had now a terrible task before him. His men were weakened and on half rations; there was every probability that the fickle natives might be troublesome on their homeward route, and worst of all they would have to fight the steady current of the river the whole way; nor would their spirits be cheered by any hope of novelty or discovery. Under these gloomy auspices Sturt re-entered the Murray on his return on the 13th February.

The homeward journey is simply a record of unrelaxed toil day after day, Sturt and M'Leay taking their turn at the oar like the rest; added to which the blacks gave them far more trouble than before. At the fall above the junction of the Darling they once more met the friend who had saved them from coming into conflict with the natives on the 24th January; he and some of his tribe assisted them to get the boat up the rapids. On the 20th of March they reached the camp on the Morumbidgee from whence they had started, but it was now abandoned, and the hope that the relief party had pushed down there to meet them was destroyed; there was nothing for it but to pull on, but human nature was rapidly giving way; the men though falling asleep at their oars never grumbled, but worked steadily, if moodily, faithful to their duty to the last. Then the river rose, and for days they struggled vainly against it. One man went mad, and had to be relieved from the oars. At last, when ninety miles from Pontebadgery, the place where Sturt believed the relief party to be camped, he determined to dispatch two men for provisions and await their return.

After six days, when the last ounce of flour had been served out, the men came back with horses and drays, and all trouble was at an end. This was on the 18th April, eighty-eight days after their departure from the depot, during which they had voyaged two thousand miles.

This expedition, from whatever light it is regarded, either as the most important contribution ever made to Australian geography, or as an example of most wonderful endurance, and patient heroism is equally one of the most glorious records in this history. The leader and his men were alike worthy of each other.

We have now had in review the opinion of many men on the future of the great interior, and seen how they all alike predicted for it barrenness and desolation. Even the satisfaction that Sturt felt at accomplishing the descent of the Murray was qualified by a consideration of the valueless country it flowed through. The question will naturally be asked, how could men of such ability and more than average shrewdness make such a gross mistake as the succeeding years have proved their opinion to be? The principal reason will be found in their want of experience in witnessing the development and improvement of land by stocking, and their ignorance of the value of the vegetation they condemned as worthless. Hume was the only man amongst them exceptionally fitted by training to judge of the capability of the land, and we do not often get at his direct opinion, nor is it likely that, with the memory of the green meadow lands and sparkling waters of the Morumbidgee fresh in his mind, it would be a very favourable one. Oxley and Sturt both wrote smarting under disappointment, and both had been suddenly confronted with a new and strange experience which they could associate with nothing but the idea of a desert. That all this seemingly desolate waste should one day have a distinctive value of its own was what they could hardly dream of.



CHAPTER IV.



Settlement at King George's Sound—The free colony of Swan River founded—Governor Stirling—Captain Bannister crosses from Perth to King George's Sound—Explorations by Lieutenant Roe—Disappointing nature of the interior—Bunbury, Wilson, and Moore—Settlement on the North Coast—Melville Island and Raffles Bay—An escaped convict's story—The fabulous Kindur River—Major Mitchell starts in search of it—Discovery of the Namoi—The Nundawar Range—Failure of the boats—Reach the Gwydir River of Cunningham—The KARAULA—Its identity with the Darling—Murder of the two bullock-drivers—Mitchell's return—Murder of Captain Barker in Encounter Bay—Major Mitchell's second expedition to trace the course of the Darling—Traces the Bogan to its junction with that river—Fort Bourke—Progress down the river—Hostility of the natives—Skirmish with them—Return—Mitchell's third expedition—The Lachlan followed—Junction of the Darling and the Murray reached—Mitchell's discovery of Australia Felix.

During the time that Oxley, Sturt, and Hume had been tracing out and painfully discovering the watershed of the Murray, a settlement had been formed at King George's Sound, in Western Australia, and some slight attempts at exploration made, but of inconsiderable extent. The settlement was entrusted to Major Lockyer, who was succeeded by Captain Barker, destined to meet a violent death at the mouth of the Murray. In 1828, Captain Stirling, in the SUCCESS, visited the coast, and made a close examination of the Swan River. He was accompanied by Frazer the botanist, who had now been present at the opening of a great deal of new country. Stirling's report was a favourable one, and the Home Government determined to form a free colony there. In 1831, we find a communication to the Colonial Government, notifying that the ISABELLA be dispatched to Hobart Town, to bring up a detachment of the 63rd regiment to relieve those of the 39th, at King George's Sound. Also, directing the withdrawal from the present settlement of both prisoners and troops.

Stirling was then appointed Lieutenant-Governor, and to induce immigration and settlement, the colonists were promised land in proportion to the capital they brought into the country, and for every labourer they brought out they received two hundred acres of land additional.

At first, the prospects of this new colony seemed most hopeful, exploration was pushed out to the eastward for one hundred miles, as far as Mount Stirling, and northward for some sixty miles or so, and the country discovered gave every promise of being fitted for both pasture and agriculture.

Captain Bannister made a trip in 1831 from Perth, the new settlement, to the old one of King George's Sound; and, although he made no important discoveries, he passed through fairly available country nearly the whole of the way.

For some reason or other, however, a period of stagnation set in, and little more was done in the way of exploring until Lieutenant Grey took the field in 1837. In this new settlement, so entirely opposed to Port Jackson in situation, no difficulties of any magnitude were experienced in passing the coast range, as had been the great obstacle of the early explorers in New South Wales. Unfortunately, however, the comparatively lower altitude of the Darling Range led to there being no such flow of water inland as even those disappointing rivers the Macquarie and Lachlan had afforded. Consequently, exploration and the ensuing occupation were, as in the parent colony, strictly confined to the immediate neighbourhood of the township, to the Swan River, and its tributaries, the Avon and the Canning.

Lieutenant Roe attempted several journeys to the eastward, and discovered many salt lakes on the tableland of the interior. Messrs. Bunbury, Wilson, and Moore made other explorations, more or less succeeding in the purposes they had in view; but they all embraced so small an area, and so little details have been preserved, that they cannot take any important rank in the history of continental explorations.

During the twenties another settlement had been formed on the northern coast of Australia; but one not destined to drag out a very long existence.

Captain Gordon Bremer, in the TAMAR, accompanied by two transports, sailed through Torres Straits and anchored in Port Essington, in 1824. The port was, however, at that time condemned as a site for a settlement, the supply of fresh water did not come up to expectations, and the dry months of the year had set in. Bremer sailed for Melville Island, one of twin islands lying off the coast. These islands, Melville and Bathurst, are separated from each other by a narrow strait that Captain King, the discoverer, mistook for a river. On Melville Island a favourable site with abundance of fresh water was found, and the usual routine of taking possession and forming an encampment gone through, and for a time things seemed to prosper; the soil of the island is good, and tropical fruits would flourish with little trouble; but hostilities commenced with the blacks, sickness broke out, and in 1829 it was determined to abandon the settlement, and since that date no attempt has been made to colonise this island, although it is now stocked with the increase of the buffaloes left behind by the TAMAR'S people.

Fort Wellington, in Raffles Bay, founded in 1826, fared no better, although controlled during its last year by the gifted and unfortunate Captain Barker. A blight of stagnation seemed in those days to hang over all attempts at settlement in the tropical regions, and in three years' time Fort Wellington was abandoned, and with it the northern coast.

Once more we must turn our attention to the southern watershed of the Darling, and the additional links of discovery in the great network of its tributaries.

Rumour, always busy with tales of the unknown interior, now spread a story of a mysterious river called the Kindur, running to the north-west. A runaway convict named Clarke, alias "the barber," brought the story up first. He said that he had long heard of the river from the natives, and at last determined to make his escape and follow it down to see if it would lead him to any other country. He, therefore, took to the bush, and started on this adventurous trip. The imaginative and highly-coloured fabrication that he related on his return, was probably invented in order to save his back, but at any rate it was plausible enough to induce the Government to dispatch an expedition to investigate the matter. This was his story. He started from Liverpool Plains, and followed a river called by the natives the GNAMOI or NAMMOY, into which he said that Oxley's river Peel flowed. Crossing this he struck another river, the KINDUR, and down this stream he travelled no less than four hundred miles before it was joined by the GNAMOI. Nothing daunted he stuck to the KINDUR, which was broad and navigable, flowing through level country and spreading into occasional lakes, until at last he reached the sea, but he acknowledged that he had lost his reckoning, and whether it was five hundred or five thousand miles he went he could not truthfully say, but he was as quite sure upon one point, that he had never travelled south of west.

When at the mouth of the river he ascended a hill and looked out to sea where he saw an island, inhabited, the natives told him, by copper-coloured men who came in large canoes to the mainland for scented wood. In addition he introduced various details of large plains, BALYRAN, that he had crossed, and a burning mountain named COURADA. As he saw no prospect of getting away from Australia, Clarke decided on returning.

This wild tale, and the expedition it led to, brings on the scene one of the most noted figures of the past, Oxley's successor, Surveyor-General Major Mitchell.

The Acting-Governor, Sir Patrick Lindesay, decided on sending out an expedition to find out the truth of this story, thinking that, at any rate, it would lead to the exploration of a great deal of new country. Accordingly, Major Mitchell received instructions to take charge of the party, and on the 21St of November, 1831, took his departure from Liverpool Plains. On the 15th of December, he came to the Peel, and crossing Oxley's Hardwicke Range, reached the Namoi River on the 16th. After penetrating some distance into a range, which he called the Nundawar Range, he made back for the Namoi, and proceeded to set up the canvas boats he had with him, intending to try to follow the river in them. His attempt was fruitless, one of the boats was soon snagged, and it became evident that it would be much easier to follow the Namoi on horseback. Leaving the river, after passing the range he had vainly tried to cross, Mitchell, on the 9th of January, 1832, came to the river Gwydir of Cunningham. Turning to the westward the party followed this river down for eighty miles, when he again returned to his northern course, and came to the largest river he had yet found. This was called, by the natives, the KARAULA, and Mitchell descended it until convinced, by its southern course and the junction of the Gwydir, that he was on the upper part of Sturt's Darling.

As the junction of the Namoi could not be far distant, Mitchell had thus laid down the course and direction of these two large rivers, although he had as yet seen nothing of the object of his search, the Kindur.

He now prepared to move once more to the north, anxious to find a river that did not belong to the Darling system. As, however, he was on the point of starting, he was overtaken by his assistant-surveyor, Finch, who was bringing on additional supplies, with the disastrous news that the blacks had attacked his camp during a temporary absence, murdered the two men, robbed the supplies, and dispersed the cattle. This misfortune put a stop to the progress of the party. They returned, and having buried the bodies of the victims, but failed to find the murderers, made their way back to the settled districts.

This journey of Major Mitchell's helped greatly to work out the courses of the rivers crossed by Oxley, and more especially those discovered by Cunningham during his trip to the Darling Downs. Mitchell travelled, as it were, a more inland but parallel track, crossing the rivers much lower down. Thus the Field River of Oxley is the NAMOI of Mitchell, Cunningham's Gwydir is recognised by the Surveyor-General, and is probably the mythical KINDUR or KEINDER, whilst the last found river, Mitchell's KARAULA, is formed by the junction of Cunningham's Dumaresque and Condamine.

When we add to this the discovery of the Drummond Range, Mitchell's first contribution to Australian geography was sufficiently important.

This year, 1832, was marked by the murder of Captain Barker, already mentioned as in turn Commandant of Fort Wellington and King George's Sound. He was returning from the latter place, after handing over charge to Captain Stirling, and on his way home landed on the eastern shore of St. Vincent's Gulf, to see if the waters of Lake Alexandrina, the termination of the Murray, had an outlet in the Gulf. Being unsuccessful he crossed the range and paid a visit to the lake. Anxious to obtain some bearings, he swam across the channel connecting the lake with the sea in order to ascend the sandhills on the opposite side. His companions watched him take several bearings from the top of the hill, descend out of view on the other side, and he was never seen again. One of the sealers from Kangaroo Island interrogated the blacks by means of a native woman of the island, who could speak broken English, and her account was that Barker met three natives as he descended the sand dune, who attacked and speared him, unarmed and naked as he was, and then cast his body in the breakers. These natives were of the same tribes that showed such determined hostility to Sturt when he first found the lake.

Although Sturt himself felt confident that the junction of the Murray and Darling were satisfactorily proved by what he saw on his famous boat excursion, he had not convinced all of the public. Major Mitchell, for one, had an entirely different theory on the subject embracing the existence of a. dividing range between the Macquarie and Lachlan rivers which would entirely preclude the Darling and Murray from joining. Time, however, proved that Sturt's instinct had not been at fault when on reaching the junction of the two rivers in his whale-boat, he felt convinced that he there saw the outflow of his old friend, the Darling.

It must be remembered that the explorations conducted by Major Mitchell were also surveys, superintended by him as Surveyor-General, which will partly explain the presence of the large body of men and equipage which it was his custom to take with him. The roll call of the members of one of his expeditions reads like that of an invading army. [See Appendix.]

In order to get some additional information concerning the elevated country that Oxley had noticed to the westward between the Lachlan and the Macquarie (on which slight foundation Major Mitchell had built his theory of the two rivers running through distinctly different basins), Mr. Dixon was sent out in 1833. This gentleman, however, for some reason did not adhere to his instructions; he followed down the Macquarie for some distance and crossed to the Bogan (Sturt's New Year's Creek), then running strong, and having followed that river for sixty-seven miles, returned to Bathurst; nothing new nor important came of this expedition.

In March, 1833, the party formed under the superintendence of the Surveyor-General left Parramatta to travel by easy stages to Buree, where they were to be overtaken by their leader. The list of the members is a long one. We who live in the days of well-equipped small parties, composed of reliable, experienced men only, would feel considerably handicapped with such a retinue. In addition to Major Mitchell, Richard Cunningham, botanist (brother to Allan Cunningham), and Mr. Larmer, assistant surveyor, there were twenty-one men; carpenters, bullock drivers, blacksmith, shoemaker, &c.

While still on the outskirts of settlement, an unhappy fate overtook Cunningham, the botanist. Leaving the party, doubtless on some scientific quest, during the morning of the 17th of April, whilst they were pushing over a dry stage to the Bogan River, he lost his way, and was never seen again.

A long and painful search was immediately instituted for the missing man, but unfortunately, through some accident, his tracks were overlooked on the third day, and it was not until the 23rd of the month that the footsteps were found. Mr. Larmer and three men were sent with an ample supply of provisions to follow the tracks until they found Cunningham, alive or dead. Three days later they returned, having found the horse he had ridden, dead, with the saddle and bridle still on. Mitchell returned to the search once more; the lost man's trail was again picked up, and he was tracked to the Bogan River. They there met with some blacks who had seen the white man's track in the bed of the river, and made the searchers understand that he had gone to the west with the "Myall" [Wild blacks who had not visited the settlements.] blackfellows.

All hope of finding him alive was now almost abandoned, but the pursuit was continued until May 5th, when the men brought back tidings that they had followed his tracks to where it disappeared near some recent fires where many natives had been encamped. Close to one of these fires they found a portion of the skirt or selvage of Cunningham's coat, numerous small fragments of his map of the colony, and, in the hollow of a tree, some yellow printed paper in which he used to carry the map. His fate was afterwards ascertained from the blacks. [ See Appendix.]

As is unfortunately so usual in these cases, Cunningham had, by wandering in eccentric and contradictory courses, accelerated his fate, by rendering the work of the tracking party so much more tedious and difficult. Had he, on finding how absolutely he was astray, remained at the first water he reached, he would have been found.

Having done all that man could do to find his lost friend, and even jeopardised the final success of his own expedition by the long delay of fourteen days, Mitchell resumed his journey by easy stages down the Bogan, and on the 25th of May reached the Darling, which was at once recognised by all the former members of the party as the "Karaula," from the peculiar attributes that characterised it. On tasting the water, they were agreeably surprised to find it fresh and sweet. The state of the country now was very different from what it was when Sturt was forced to retreat. With that explorer's graphic account of the barren solitude that he met with, fresh in the reader's memory, let him contrast it with what Mitchell writes, remembering that one was encamped beside a salt stream, and the latter writer beside a fresh water river.

"We were extremely fortunate, however, in the place to which the bounteous hand of Providence had led us. Abundance of pasture, indeed such excellent grass as we had not seen in the whole journey, covered the fine forest ground on the bank of the river. There were four kinds, but the cattle appeared to relish most a strong species of AUTHISTIRIA, or kangaroo grass."

Finding the place eligible in every respect for the formation of a depot, a stockade of logs was erected and the encampment christened Fort Bourke.

The boats were launched, but the navigation of the river was found to be impeded by shallow rapids, so the party returned to Fort Bourke, and Mitchell with four men made an excursion down the river to the point where Sturt and Hume turned back. D'Urbans group was also 'Visited, and bearings taken to whatever elevations were in sight. On returning to the depot the camp was broken up and the whole party started down the Darling (the CALLA-WATTA of the natives) on the 8th June. During their progress they found the tree marked H. H. by Hume, at Sturt's limit, and they now noticed that in places the river water was salt or brackish. On the 11th of July, after following the course of the river for three hundred miles, and ascertaining beyond all doubt that it must be identical with the junction in the Murray, noticed by Captain Sturt, Mitchell determined to return; the unvarying sameness of the country they had travelled over holding forth no hope of any important discovery being made, in the space intervening between their lowest camp and Sturt's junction. The natives, too, had been an incessant cause of annoyance to them; robbing the camp at every opportunity, and keeping the leader in constant anxiety for the safety of any of the members of his party, whom duty compelled to leave the main body. On the very day, almost at the very hour, when Mitchell made up his mind to return, the first hostile collision between the two races occurred; a collision which had only been hitherto averted by the admirable patience of the Major and his men. On the 29th June, he wrote:—

"I never saw such unfavourable specimens of the aborigines as these children of the smoke, [Referring to their constant habit of burning the grass.] they were so barbarously and implacably hostile, and shamelessly dishonest, and so little influenced by reason that the more they saw of our superior weapons and means of defence, the more they showed their hatred and tokens of defiance."

On the morning of this day, when he had settled in his own mind the futility of further progress, two of the men were away at the river, and five of the the bullock drivers were also at another bend, collecting their cattle. One of the blacks whom they had nick-named King Peter tried to snatch the kettle of water from the hand of the man who was carrying it; and on being resisted he struck him senseless with his nulla-nulla. The companion of the wounded man shot King Peter in the groin, and his majesty tumbled into the river and swam across. The tribe now advanced against them, and two shots were fired in self defence, one of which accidentally wounded a gin. Three men from the camp hearing the firing came up, and one more native was shot, who was preparing to spear one of the men. The natives retreating, the men went in search of the bullock-drivers, whom they found endeavouring to raise a bogged bullock: their timely arrival probably saved these men's lives, as they were unarmed and unprepared.

War being thus declared, a careful watch was kept up, but no attack was made, and the explorers departed unmolested.

In speaking of this skirmish, Mitchell, seemingly worked up to a sentimental pitch by hearing some gins crying out across the river in the night time, says:—

"It was then that I regretted most bitterly the inconsiderate conduct of some of the men. I was indeed liable to pay dear for geographical discovery, when my honour and character were delivered over to convicts, on whom, although I might confide as to courage, I could not always rely for humanity."

By his own account, as given above, the affray was provoked by the blacks, who compelled the men to use their weapons to save their own lives; the reflections then, on their humanity, and the danger in which his character stood in consequence, are slightly out of place.

The travellers now retraced their steps, and beyond the delays caused by some of the bullocks knocking up, their return journey to Fort Bourke was unmarked by anything of interest. From Fort Bourke they returned, partly along their outward track, to the head of the Bogan, and reached a newly-formed cattle station belonging to Mr. Lee, of Bathurst, on the 9th of September.

The great fact added to the geographical knowledge of Australia by the successful termination of this trip, was the identity of the Darling with the KARAULA on the north, and with Sturt's Murray junction on the south. It was now satisfactorily settled that this river was the channel that received all the tributary streams flowing westward—so far north, at any rate, as Cunningham's researches had extended, and that therefore their final outlet was in Lake Alexandrina, and the idea of a river winding through the interior to the north-west coast had to be finally relinquished.

This journey of Mitchell's was also instrumental in somewhat palliating the view held of the uninhabitable nature of the far interior; although the true character of the country had yet to be learnt and appreciated. His stay on the banks of the Darling at least lifted from those plains the stigma of a grassless, naked waste, intersected by a river of brine.

Mitchell, too, was a keen observer of the habits and customs of the blacks, he was remarkably quick at detecting tribal differences and distinctions, and his record of his intercourse with them, which occupies so large a portion of his journals, was interesting then, when so little had been written on the subject, and is interesting now as the account of the white man's first incursions into the hunting ground of a fast vanishing race.

Mitchell's next expedition took place in 1836, in the month of March. As before, it was to be more of a connecting survey, confirming and verifying previous discoveries, than a fresh departure into an utterly new region; but it turned out to be productive of the most important results.

The Surveyor-General was informed that the survey of the Darling was to be completed with the least possible delay, that having returned to the point where his last journey terminated, he was to trace the Darling into the Murray, and crossing his party over that river by means of his boats, follow it up, and regain the colony somewhere at Yass Plains. This programme was, however, departed from in many ways.

The new ground broken by Mitchell would thus be the Murray River above the junction with the Morumbidgee or Murrumbidgee, as it was now called, and it was supposed that he would be able to identify it with the Hume River of the explorer of that name.

A long continued drought was in full force when Mitchell commenced his preparations; horses and bullocks in good condition were in consequence hard to obtain; but no expense was spared by the Government in providing the animals required. On reaching Bathurst, he was informed that even the Lachlan was dry.

In spite of the state of the weather and country, Major Mitchell departed in high spirits. He writes:—

"I remembered that exactly that morning, twenty-four years before, I had marched down the glacis of Elvas to the tune of 'St. Patrick's Day in the Morning,' as the sun rose over the beleagured towers of Badajoz. Now, without any of the 'pride, pomp, and circumstances of glorious war,' I was proceeding on a service not very likely to be peaceful, for the natives here assured me that the myalls were coming up 'murry coola' [Very angry.] to meet us."

On March 17th, 1836, this start took place, but it was not until the end of the month that he reached the limit of the cattle stations, and then he was at the point where Oxley had left the river and turned south to avoid the flooded marshes. Oxley wrote of a country that no living thing would stop in if it could possibly get away; twenty years afterwards, Mitchell writes of the same place:—

"In no district have I seen cattle so numerous as all along the Lachlan, and, notwithstanding the very dry season, they are nearly all in good condition."

As might have been expected, he followed down the Lachlan riding dry-shod over the swamps and flats that had barred Oxley's progress, and finding his lakes only green and grassy plains. Such had been the effect of the exceptional season during which the late Surveyor-General had conducted his explorations, that the country, save for the few land-marks afforded by the hills here and there, could scarcely be recognised from his description. Mitchell seems to have been strongly imbued with two leading ideas, one being the existence of well-defined mountain chains in the interior, forming systematic watersheds in a country where we now know there is no system; the other that former explorers, however reliable they might have been in their main facts, were quite at sea in any deductions they had drawn from them, and that his theories would be confirmed to their discomfiture.

The Surveyor-General had with him as second on this trip, Mr. Stapylton, a surveyor, and his company consisted of Burnett, the overseer, and twenty-two men, some of whom had been with him before.

For some reason or other he seemed particularly anxious to upset Sturt's positive belief that the junction of the large river with the Murray discovered by him, was the confluence of the Darling and the Murray. During his journey down the Lachlan he returns to this idea again, and his remarks are decidedly inconsistent with his former statements. On turning back from following the Darling down, his words were:—

"The identity of this river with that which had been seen to enter the Murray, now admitted of little doubt, and the continuation of the survey to that point was scarcely an object worth the peril likely to attend it."

On the Lachlan, he writes:—

"I considered it necessary now to ascertain, if possible, and before the heavy part of our equipment moved further, whether the Lachlan actually joined the Murrumbidgee near the point where Mr. Oxley saw its waters covering the country, or whether it pursued a course so much more to the westward, as to have been taken for the Darling by Captain Sturt. Should I succeed in reaching the Lachlan at about sixty miles west of my camp, I might be satisfied that it was this river which Captain Sturt mistook for the Darling, and then I might seek that river by crossing the range on the north. Whereas, should I find sufficient reason to believe that the Darling would join the Murray, I might continue my journey down the Lachlan until I reduced the distance across to the Darling as much as the scarcity of water might render necessary."

On the whole, then, Mitchell did not seem inclined to give Sturt any credit for his discovery, until he had actually seen the two rivers unite, and there could no longer be any room for doubt on the subject.

A long excursion to the westward for some days, resulted in nothing but thirsty nights, and having finally to turn back from country bounded only by an unbroken horizon. The descent of the Lachlan was continued, and on May 5th, they reached Oxley's lowest point on the river, where he had given up the quest as hopeless amid the shallow, stagnant lagoons that then covered the face of the country. The tree marked by Oxley himself was not found, it having been, as was ascertained, burnt down by the blacks, and the bottle buried by him, broken by a child. Two trees were seen marked respectively W.W. and I.W., 1817. This was the place where Oxley left the river the second time, after his fruitless trip to the south, and from here he struck across to the Macquarie.

Through level plains and by the beds of erstwhile lakes, the course of the river continued, and as the party proceeded they found it abundantly watered. From his intercourse with the native inhabitants, Mitchell was now convinced that the Lachlan or Kalare would soon join the Murrumbidgee, so that when on the 12th May he suddenly found himself on the banks of a river that he thought surpassed all the Australian rivers he had yet seen, he was not surprised.

Soon afterwards, as the Major was anxious not to encumber himself with all his heavy waggons to the junction of the Darling, as he would have to return again, a depot was formed, and the men divided. Mitchell, with a lightly equipped party following down the river, leaving Stapylton in charge of the camp.

In a short time the advance party came to the Murray, and immediately found themselves amongst their former enemies of the Darling, who hearing of their approach, through the medium of other tribes, had come a distance of over two hundred miles to settle the old score between them. At first a kind of hollow truce was maintained, but this evidently could not last long; for two days the natives followed the explorers, seeking to cut off any stragglers; making the work of gathering and minding the cattle and horses one of considerable danger.

At last Mitchell was convinced that he must read them a lesson, or lose some of his men, and have to fight his way back, with the whole country roused. Half the party were then sent back, under the overseer, to conceal themselves in the scrub and allow the natives to pass on in pursuit of the tracks; this ambuscade, however, was scented out by the dogs accompanying the blacks, and the natives halted, poising their spears. One of the men hastily fired, and a retreat was made for the bank of the river by the blacks. The scrub party followed them up firing, and no sooner did those in advance hear the sound of the shots, than they rushed down to join in the fray, leaving the black boy's gin the sole protector of the drays, and equipment. On his return, the Major found her standing erect at the head of the leading horse, with a drawn sword over her shoulder.

Her appearance was, above all, both laughable and interesting. She was a tall, gaunt woman, with one disfigured eye, and her attitude, as she stood there with the naked weapon in her hand, faithful guard of all their belongings, was a picture that Mitchell did not soon forget.

The fight was soon over; in a very short space of time the over-confident warriors of the interior were driven ignominously across the river with the loss of seven braves. This, after invading the territory of a friendly tribe in order to provoke a battle with the whites, and boasting that formerly they had driven them back from the Darling, was a blow that they could not get over, and the result was that the whites were not again molested. It turned out that this pugnacious tribe was the same that threatened Sturt at the Darling junction, when the energetic interference of one man was so effectual. This remarkable savage, it seems, was dead and his influence lost.

On the 31st May, Mitchell struck the Darling some distance above the junction, and traced its course upwards a short way, until he again felt convinced that it was the same river that he had been on before, He returned and examined the junction, which he says he recognised from the view given in Captain Sturt's work [Note, end of paragraph] and the adjacent localities described by him. Full of anxiety for the safety of his depot, and considering that he had done enough to verify the outflow of the Darling, he at once started up the Murray, and was happily relieved by finding his camp in perfect quiet and safety.

[Note Captain Sturt, writing in 1848, and speaking of Major Mitchell's expedition, says:—"In due time he came to the disputed junction, which he tells us he recognised from its resemblance to a drawing of it in my first work. As I have since been on the spot, I am sorry to say that it is not at all like the place, because it obliges me to reject the only praise Sir Thomas Mitchell ever gave me." The original sketch of the junction having been lost, Sturt, who was nearly blind at the time of the publication of his work, got the assistance of a friend, who drew it from his verbal description.]

First fixing the junction of the Murray and Murrumbidgee, the boats were launched, and the whole of the party crossed the Murray, and the journey up the southern bank commenced. On the 20th of June, they reached Swan Hill and camped at the foot of it. The country was in every way desirable, and the progress of the party was unchecked. On the 8th of July, the Loddon was discovered and named, and on the 10th, the Avoca. Mitchell was now convinced that he had found the Eden of Australia, and his enthusiasm in describing it is unbounded. On the 18th of July, he discovered the Wimmera, and on the 31st, the Glenelg. Here he launched his boat once more, but found his way stopped at the outset by a fall, and the river had to be followed on land. On the 18th of August, after many excursions, the river being now much broader, the boats were again resorted to, and in two days they reached the coast a little to the east of Cape Northumberland.

Returning to the camp, the expedition made east, and reached Portland Bay, where they found a farm established by the Messrs. Henty, who had been there then nearly two years. Here they obtained some small supplies, and again left on their homeward journey. On the 4th September Mitchell abandoned one of his boats, in order to lighten his equipage, as the draught work was excessively heavy for his cattle, and one boat would answer the purpose of crossing rivers. On the 10th, he caught sight of a range, and named it the Australian Pyrenees, and on the 19th the party separated.

The Major and some of the men pushed on with the freshest of the animals, leaving Stapylton and the remainder of the party to spell for a while, and bring the knocked-up beasts slowly on.

On the 30th, Mitchell ascended Mount Macedon, and from the top recognised Port Phillip.

"No stockyards nor cattle were visible, nor even smoke, although at the highest northern point of the bay I saw a mass of white objects, which might have been either tents or vessels."

But Mitchell was not to arrive home without another fatality amongst his party. On October 13th, when looking for a crossing in a river, one of the men, named James Taylor, was drowned.

On the 17th, after passing through a forest, they recognised with great satisfaction, the lofty "Yarra" trees, and the low verdant alluvial flats of the Murray. Once across the river, the boat was sunk in a deep lagoon, and the boat carriage left on the bank for the use of Stapylton. Three volunteers went back to meet him, and assist in crossing the Ovens and Goulburn. The advance party were now almost within the settled districts, and with the safe arrival of Stapylton at the Murrumbidgee, on November 11th, the history of the discovery of AUSTRALIA FELIX ends.

Sir Thomas Mitchell had been singularly favoured during this journey, his route had led him through a country possessing every variety of feature, from snow-topped mountains to level plains, watered by permanently-flowing stream and rivers; fitted, as he says, for the immediate occupation of the grazier, and the farmer. It, therefore, was of more real benefit to the colony than the former exploratory journeys, that had met with only partial success in this respect.

He had well carried out his instructions, and obtained a full knowledge of the country south of the Murray, and of the rivers there; flowing either into that river, or into the sea; confirming the impression already entertained of the great value of the district, and the report of Hume and Hovell, who with their slender resources were unable to do much in the way of extended examination.

We have seen that the brothers Henty, of Tasmania, had formed a settlement at Portland Bay, and in 1835 the historic founding of Port Phillip settlement by Batman took place, so that the mere extension of settlement would soon have thrown open for settlement the splendid area that Mitchell was just in time to claim as his discovery. The story of Batman's compact with the blacks, by which he asserted his right to a princely territory is too well-known to require repetition; [Note, end of paragraph] it is scarcely necessary to add that such a preposterous demand was neither ratified by the government, nor recognised by the settlers.

[Note: The agreement was between Messrs. Batman, Gellibrand, Swanston, and Simpson, on the one side, and the natives were represented by Jagajaga, Cooloolook, Bungaree, Yanyan, Mowstrip, and Mommamala, the price was fixed at an annuity of two hundred a year, in return for 750,000 acres of land. Mr. Gellibrand afterwards perished in the bush with a companion, Mr. Hesse, having lost himself through persisting in keeping in the wrong direction, although warned by a guide who left them on finding Gellibrand determined to go wrong.]

It was through the energy of the Tasmanian colonists that this settlement of Port Phillip took place; as already noticed, Port Phillip was abandoned, almost without the slightest examination, by Colonel Collins in favour of Tasmania, and now, after thirty years had passed, the abundant flocks and herds of the little island forced the owners to look to the mainland for extended pastures.

One of the incidents of the early settlement was also the discovery of Buckley, a white man, who having escaped from Collins' party in 1803, had been living with the natives ever since.

In 1836 Colonel Light surveyed the shores of St. Vincent's Gulf, and selected the site of the present city of Adelaide; Governor Hindmarsh and a company of emigrants soon after arrived, and the colony of South Australia was proclaimed.

The continent was now being invaded on three sides. From Perth on the western shore, from St. Vincent's Gulf and Port Phillip on the south, and from the settled districts of New South Wales and from Moreton Bay on the east.

Henceforth, the tale of exploration embraces many simultaneous expeditions; no longer is the whole of the narrative confined to the struggle of one man, hopelessly endeavouring to surmount the coast range, or toiling across the western plains, anxiously watched by the little community at Port Jackson. Each new-formed centre had their members pushing out, month after month, and continually adding to the knowledge of Australia.

As usual, the records of most of these private expeditions have not been preserved, and the utmost the historian can do is to trace out the broad lines of discovery, leaving the reader to consider the detail filled in by the monotonous, if valuable, and untiring efforts of the pioneer squatters. Already these men and their subordinates were close on the footsteps of the explorers; should the adventurer remain some months absent from civilization, he found, on his return, settlement far across what had been the frontier line when he departed. Hundreds of lives have been laid down in this service, under as strong a sense of duty, and under circumstances as heroic as any of the deaths in the roll of martial history, and the names of the victims unknown, and their graves unhonoured. They have only been members of the great band ever forcing a way, and smoothing a road for a commercial population, to whom their deeds, their struggles, their hopes, and their fates are often but a sealed book. But the feelings of a man who knows that he has founded homes for future thousands, must be a greater recompense than any his fellowmen could give him.



CHAPTER V.



Lieutenants Grey and Lushington on the West Coast—Narrow escape—Start with an equipment of Timor ponies—Grey wounded by the natives—Cave drawings—Return, having discovered the Glenelg—Grey's second expedition—Landed at Bernier Island, in Shark's Bay, with three whale-boats—Cross to borne Island—Violent storm—Discovery of the Gascoyne—Return to Bernier Island—Find their CACHE of provisions destroyed by a hurricane—Hopeless position—Attempted landing at Gautheaume Bay—Destruction of the boats—Walk to Perth—Great sufferings—Death of Smith—Eyre and the overlanders—Discovery of Lake Hindmarsh—Exploration of Gippsland—Eyre's explorations to the north—Discovery of Lake Torrens—Disappointment in the country bordering on it—Determines to go to King George's Sound—Repeated attempts to reach the head of the Great Australian Bight—Loss of horses—Barren and scrubby country—Final determination to send back most of the party— Starts with overseer and three natives—Hardship and suffering—Murder of the overseer by two of the natives—Eyre continues his journey with the remaining boy—Relieved by the MISSISSIPPI whaler—Reaches King George's Sound.