We Had Still Some Miles To Go, To Get Round The Northern End Of The Boggy Lake.

Alec Ross and Tommy walked across, to hunt up any traces of natives, etc., and to look for water.

On clearing this boggy feature, we ascended into some densely scrubby granite rises; these had some bare rocks exposed here and there, but no indentations for holding water could be seen. At fifteen or sixteen miles, having passed all the ridges, and entered scrubs and mallee again, Alec and Tommy overtook us, Mr. Young having remained behind with their camels, and reported that they had found one small rock-hole. Alec said it had twenty or thirty gallons of water in it, but Tommy said there was only a little drop, so I did not think it worth while to delay by sending any camels back so far for so little reward. We saw two or three dozen grass-trees to-day, also some quandong and currajong trees, and camped again in scrubs where there was only a few leguminous bushes for the camels to eat. We had travelled twenty-eight miles, which only made twenty-four straight. The last three days had been warm, the thermometer going up to 98 degrees in the shade each day at about twelve o'clock; the camels were very thirsty, and would not feed as the provender was so very poor.

During the last few days we had met with occasional patches of grassy and clayey ground, generally where the yellow-barked eucalypts grew, and we passed numerous small clay-channels and pans, in which rain-water might lodge for some time after a shower, but it was evident from the appearance of the grass and vegetation that no rains could have visited the region for a year, or it might be for a hundred years; every vegetable thing seemed dry, sere, or dead. On the 13th of October, at twelve miles from camp, we passed over some more scrubby granite ridges, where some extent of bare rock lay exposed. I searched about it, but the indents were so small and shallow that water could not remain in them for more than a week after rains had filled them. While I was searching on foot, Mr. Young and Tommy, from their camels' backs, saw another mass of bare rocks further away to the north-west. I took Tommy with me, on Reechy, and we went over to the spot, while the party continued marching on; on arriving we found a very pretty piece of scenery. Several hundred acres of bare rocks, with grassy flats sloping down from them to the west, and forming little watercourses or flat water-channels; there were great numbers of crows, many fresh natives' tracks, and the smoke of several fires in the surrounding scrub. Tommy took the lower ground, while I searched the rocks. He soon found a small native well in a grassy water-channel, and called out to me. On joining him I found that there was very little water in sight, but I thought a supply might be got with a shovel, and I decided to send him on my camel to bring the party back, for we had come over 200 miles from Queen Victoria's Spring, and this was the first water I had seen since leaving there. We gave little Reechy, or as I usually called her Screechy, all the water we could get out of the well, with one of Tommy's boots; she drank it out of his hat, and they started away.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 316 of 394
Words from 163868 to 164463 of 204780