Immediately Around This Singular Monument Of Native Industry, There Are A Few Hundred Acres Of Very Pretty Country, Beautifully Grassed And Ornamented With A Few Mulga (Acacia) Trees, Standing Picturesquely Apart.

The spot lies in a basin or hollow, and is surrounded in all directions by scrubs and rolling sandhills.

How we got to it I can scarcely tell, as our guide kept constantly changing his course, so that the compass was of little or no use, and it was only by the sextant I could discover our whereabouts; by it I found we had come fifty-eight miles from Youldeh on a bearing of south 68 degrees east, we being now in latitude 30 degrees 43' and longitude 132 degrees 44'. There was so little water here that I was unable to remain more than one day, during which the thermometer indicated 104 degrees in the shade.

To the eastward of this dam there was a sandhill with a few black oaks (casuarinas) growing upon it, about a quarter of a mile away. A number of stones of a calcareous nature were scattered about on it; on going up this hill the day we rested the animals here, I was surprised to find a broad path had been cleared amongst the stones for some dozens of yards, an oak-tree at each end being the terminal points. At the foot of each tree at the end of the path the largest stones were heaped; the path was indented with the tramplings of many natives' feet, and I felt sure that it was one of those places where the men of this region perform inhuman mutilations upon the youths and maidens of their tribe. I questioned old Jimmy about these matters, but he was like all others of his race, who, while admitting the facts, protest that they, individually, have never officiated at such doings.

Upon leaving Pylebung Jimmy informed me that Mowling was the next watering-place, and said it lay nearly east from here; but I found we went nearly north-east to reach it; this we did in seventeen miles, the country through which we passed being, as usual, all sandhills and scrub. Mowling consisted of a small acacia hollow, where there were a few boulders of granite; in these were two small holes, both as dry as the surface of the rocks in their vicinity. On our route from Pylebung, we had seen the tracks of a single bullock; he also had found his way to Mowling, and probably left it howling; but it must have been some time since his visit.

From hence old Jimmy led us a good deal south of east, and we arrived at another exposure of granite rocks in the dense scrubs. This place Jimmy called Whitegin. It was ten or eleven miles from Mowling. There was a small crevice between the rounded boulders of rock, which held barely sufficient water for the three horses, the camels getting none, though they persisted in bothering us all the afternoon, and appeared very thirsty. They kept coming up to the camp perpetually, pulling our canvas bucket and tin utensils about with their lips, and I found the cunning of a camel in endeavouring to get water at the camp far exceeded that of any horse.

There were a few dozen acres of pretty ground here with good grass and herbage on it. We had a great deal of trouble to-day in getting the camels along; the foal or calf belonging to the old riding-cow got itself entangled in its mother's nose-rope, and as we did not then understand the management of camels, and how their nose-ropes should be adjusted, we could not prevent the little brute from tearing the button clean through the cartilage of the poor old cow's nose; this not only caused the animal frightful pain, but made her more obstinate and stubborn and harder to get along than before. The agony the poor creature suffered from flies must have been excruciating, as after this accident they entered her nostrils in such numbers that she often hung back, and would cough and snort until she had ejected a great quantity of blood and flies from her nose.

For the last few miles we had not been annoyed by quite so much spinifex as usual, but the vast amount of dead wood and underbrush was very detrimental to the progress of the camels, who are not usually in the habit of lifting their feet very high, though having the power, they learn it in time, but not before their toes got constantly entangled with the dead sticks, which made them very sore.

The scrub here and all the way we had come consisted mostly of mallee (Eucalyptus dumosa) mulga, prickly bushes (hakea), some grevillea-trees, and a few oaks (casuarinas). This place, Whitegin, was eighty-five miles straight from Youldeh; we had, however, travelled about 100 miles to reach it, as Jimmy kept turning and twisting about in the scrubs in all directions. On leaving Whitegin we travelled several degrees to north of east, the thermometer in the shade while we rested there going up to 103 degrees. Jimmy said the next place we should get water at was Wynbring, and from what we could make out of his jargon, he seemed to imply that Wynbring was a large watercourse descending from a mountain and having a stony bed; he also said we were now close up, and that it was only a pickaninny way. However, the shades of night descended upon us once more in the scrubs of this desert, and we were again compelled to encamp in a place lonely, and without water, amidst the desolations of this scrub-enthroned tract. Choking with thirst and sleepless with anxiety, we pass the hours of night; no dews descend upon this heated place, and though towards dawn a slightly cooler temperature is felt, the reappearance of the sun is now so near, that there has been no time for either earth or man to be benefited by it.

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