successful in so far that Burke crossed Australia from south to north before Stuart, and was the first traveller who had done so.  Burke and Wills both died upon Cooper’s Creek after their return from Carpentaria upon the field of their renown.  Charles Gray, one of the party, died, or was killed, a day or two before returning thither, and John King, the sole survivor, was rescued by Alfred Howitt.  Burke’s and Stuart’s lines of travel, though both pushing from south to north, were separated by a distance of over 400 miles in longitude.  These travellers, or heroes I suppose I ought to call them, were neither explorers nor bushmen, but they were brave and undaunted, and they died in the cause they had undertaken.

When it became certain in Melbourne that some mishap must have occurred to these adventurers, Victoria, South Australia, and Queensland each sent out relief parties.  South Australia sent John McKinlay, who found Gray’s grave, and afterwards made a long exploration to Carpentaria, where, not finding any vessel as he expected, he had an arduous struggle to reach a Queensland cattle station near Port Dennison on the eastern coast.  Queensland sent Landsborough by sea to Carpentaria, where he was landed and left to live or die as he might, though of course he had a proper equipment of horses, men, and gear.  He followed up the Flinders River of Stokes, had a fine country to traverse; got on to the head of the Warrego, and finally on to the Darling River in New South Wales.  He came across no traces whatever of Burke.  Victoria sent a relief expedition under Walker, with several Queensland black troopers.  Walker, crossing the lower Barcoo, found a tree of Leichhardt’s marked L, being the most westerly known.  Walker arrived at Carpentaria without seeing any traces of the missing Burke and Wills; but at the mouth of the Albert River met the master of the vessel that had conveyed Landsborough; the master had seen or heard nothing of Burke.  Another expedition fitted out by Victoria, and called the Victorian Contingent Relief Expedition, was placed under the command of Alfred Howitt in 1861.  At this time a friend of mine, named Conn, and I were out exploring for pastoral runs, and were in retreat upon the Darling, when we met Howitt going out.  When farther north I repeatedly urged my companion to visit the Cooper, from which we were then only eighty or ninety miles away, in vain.  I urged how we might succour some, if not all, of the wanderers.  Had we done so we should have found and rescued King, and we might have been in time to save Burke and Wills also; but Conn would not agree to go.  It is true we were nearly starved as it was, and might have been entirely starved had we gone there, but by good fortune we met and shot a stray bullock that had wandered from the Darling, and this happy chance saved our lives.  I may here remark that poor Conn and two other exploring comrades of those days, named Curlewis and McCulloch, were all subsequently, not only killed but partly