April 4.

I again this morning used every effort to induce some more of the men to abandon a portion of their loads.  I represented to them their weak state, the small supply of provisions they had with them, and the difficulty they already found in keeping up with the party; but all these arguments and every other I could make use of were unavailing; the tenacity with which they clung to a worthless property, even at the risk of their lives, is almost incredible, and it is to be borne in mind that this property was not their own, but what they had taken from the wreck of the boats.  Did I even induce one to throw anything away another avaricious fellow would pick it up; and their thoughts and conversation, instead of running upon making the best of their way home and saying their lives, consisted in conjectures as to what they would realize from their ill-gotten and embarrassing booty.

Superior native path and wells.

The course I pursued was one of 180 degrees and we soon fell in with the native path which we had quitted yesterday; but it now became wide, well beaten, and differing altogether by its permanent character from any I had seen in the southern portion of this continent.  For the first five miles we traversed scrubby stony hills, thickly wooded with banksia trees; but the limestone here again cropped out and we entered a very fertile valley, running north and south and terminating in a larger one which drained the country from east to west.  This valley is remarkable as containing one Xanthorrhoea (grass-tree) being the farthest point to the north at which I have found this tree.  In it also was a gigantic ant’s nest, being the most southerly one I had yet seen.  All these circumstances convinced me that we were about to enter a very interesting region.  And as we wound along the native path my wonder augmented; the path increased in breadth and in its beaten appearance, whilst along the side of it we found frequent wells, some of which were ten and twelve feet deep and were altogether executed in a superior manner.

Native warran ground.  Plains abounding in the warran plant.

We now crossed the dry bed of a stream and from that emerged upon a tract of light fertile soil, quite overrun with warran plants,* the root of which is a favourite article of food with the natives.  This was the first time we had yet seen this plant on our journey, and now for three and a half consecutive miles we traversed a fertile piece of land literally perforated with the holes the natives had made to dig this root; indeed we could with difficulty walk across it on that account, whilst this tract extended east and west as far as we could see.

(Footnote.  The Warran in a species of Dioscorea, a sort of yam like the sweet potato.  It is known by the same name both on the east and west side of the continent.)