old man agreed to guide overseer Burnett and Piper to the place.  I conducted the wheel-carriages along the firm plain outside and, after proceeding more than 2 1/2 miles, I heard a shot from Burnett, announcing his arrival at the water.  I accordingly proceeded with the party in that direction, and we encamped near the river, amid the finest verdure that we had yet seen and after a journey of nine miles.  We were informed that the Lachlan contained water in more abundance one or two days’ journey lower down, and that the Murrumbidgee was not far to the southward.

May 8.

This day being Sunday I gave the cattle rest; but Mr. Stapylton went down the river with two men to make sure of water at our next stage.  They found a pond at the distance of about eleven miles; the way to it being over a fine hard plain covered with mesembryanthemum and salsolae.  The party saw a large kangaroo, the first observed on the banks of the Lachlan during this journey.  The old man and his family had proceeded across to Waljeers in order to procure mussels, the object, as I understood, of his journey from the Murrumbidgee.

May 9.

We moved to the pond above-mentioned, named Yambarenga, and found near it a number of large huts similar to those of the Darling.  The water was very green and muddy but the taste was good.  The plain we traversed this day exactly resembled the best of the ground on the Darling; and in some places I observed the Quandang bushes,* having their branches covered with a parasitical plant whose bright crimson flowers were very ornamental.**

(Footnote.  Fusanus acuminatus.)

(**Footnote.  Loranthus quandang, Lindley manuscripts; incanus, foliis oppositis lineari-oblongis obsolete triplinerviis obtusis, pedunculis axillaribus folio multo bevioribus apice divaricato-bifidis 6-floris, floribus pentameris aequalibus, petalis linearibus, antheris linearibus basi insertis.  Next L. gaudichaudi.)

THE MURRUMBIDGEE SEEN FROM THE LACHLAN.

South of the spot where we now encamped the ground, which consisted of firm red clay, gradually rose; and from a tree Burnett observed the tall yarras of the Murrumbidgee at a distance of about eight miles.  The latitude observed was 34 degrees 14 minutes 37 seconds South, longitude 144 degrees 25 minutes East.

May 10.

A thick fog prevented the men from getting the cattle together as early as usual.  In the meantime I made a drawing of the native female and the scenery around; and we finally left the encamping ground at a quarter before eleven.  The first part of this day’s journey was over a rising ground, on leaving which the country seemed as if it descended westward into a lower basin, so that I took the river Lachlan which lay below to be already the Murrumbidgee.

RICH TINTS ON THE SURFACE.