I Gave My Horse An Hour's Rest Here, With The Thermometer At 102 Degrees In The Shade. There Was No Grass, And Not Being Possessed Of Organs That Could Digest Triodia He Simply Rested.

On starting again, the hills I had left now almost entirely disappeared, and looked flattened out to a long low line.

I travelled over many miles of burnt, stony, brown, gravelly undulations; at every four or five miles I obtained a view of similar country beyond; at thirty-five miles from the creek the country all round me was exactly alike, but here, on passing a rise that seemed a little more solid than the others, I noticed in a kind of little valley some signs of recent native encampments; and the feathers of birds strewn about - there were hawks', pigeons', and cockatoos' feathers. I rode towards them, and right under my horse's feet I saw a most singular hole in the ground. Dismounting, I found it was another of those extraordinary cups from whence the natives obtain water. This one was entirely filled up with boughs, and I had great difficulty in dragging them out, when I perceived that this orifice was of some depth and contained some water; but on reaching up a drop, with the greatest difficulty, in my hand, I found it was quite putrid; indeed, while taking out the boughs my nasal horgin, as Jimmy would call it, gave me the same information.

(ILLUSTRATION: THE STINKING PIT.)

I found the hole was choked up with rotten leaves, dead animals, birds, and all imaginable sorts of filth.

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