I Have Conducted Five Public Expeditions And Several Private Ones.

The latter will not be recorded in these volumes, not because there were no incidents of interest, but because they were conducted, in connection with other persons, for entirely pastoral objects.

Experiences of hunger, thirst, and attacks by hostile natives during those undertakings relieved them of any monotony they might otherwise display. It is, however, to my public expeditions that I shall now confine my narrative.

The wild charm and exciting desire that induce an individual to undertake the arduous tasks that lie before an explorer, and the pleasure and delight of visiting new and totally unknown places, are only whetted by his first attempt, especially when he is constrained to admit that his first attempt had not resulted in his carrying out its objects.

My first and second expeditions were conducted entirely with horses; in all my after journeys I had the services of camels, those wonderful ships of the desert, without whose aid the travels and adventures which are subsequently recorded could not possibly have been achieved, nor should I now be alive, as Byron says, to write so poor a tale, this lowly lay of mine. In my first and second expeditions, the object I had in view was to push across the continent, from different starting points, upon the South Australian Transcontinental Telegraph Line, to the settled districts of Western Australia. My first expedition was fitted out entirely by Baron von Mueller, my brother-in-law, Mr. G.D. Gill, and myself. I was joined in this enterprise by a young gentleman, named Samuel Carmichael, whom I met in Melbourne, and who also contributed his share towards the undertaking. The furthest point reached on this journey was about 300 miles from my starting point. On my return, upon reaching the Charlotte Waters Telegraph Station, in latitude 25 degrees 55' and longitude 135 degrees I met Colonel Warburton and his son, whom I had known before. These gentlemen informed me, to my great astonishment, they were about to undertake an exploring expedition to Western Australia, for two well-known capitalists of South Australia, namely the Honourable Sir Thomas Elder and Captain Hughes. I was also informed that a South Australian Government expedition, for the same purpose, was just in advance of them, under the command of Mr. William C. Gosse. This information took me greatly by surprise, though perhaps an explorer should not admit such a feeling. I had just returned from an attempt of the same kind, beaten and disappointed. I felt if ever I took the field again, against two such formidable rivals as were now about to attempt what I had failed in, both being supplied with camels by Sir Thomas Elder, my chances of competing with them would be small indeed, as I could only command horses, and was not then known to Sir Thomas Elder, the only gentleman in Australia who possessed camels.

The fact of two expeditions starting away simultaneously, almost as soon as I had turned my back upon civilisation, showed me at once that my attempt, I being regarded as a Victorian, had roused the people and Government of South Australia to the importance of the question which I was the first to endeavour to solve - namely, the exploration of the unknown interior, and the possibility of discovering an overland route for stock through Central Australia, to the settlements upon the western coast.

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