road northwards being thus thrown open to me, I returned to my original purpose, and determined on the morrow to pursue a northerly course directly into the interior, in the hope that ere the surface water left by the thunder-storm should be dried up, I might reach such another creek as the one I was about to quit, or find some other such permanent place of safety; leaving the examination of the upper branches of the creek, and of the mountain ranges to the period of my return.  Accordingly on the morning of the 13th, we left our position, crossing to the proper right bank of the creek, and breaking through the nearer box tree forest, traversed open plains, the soil of which was principally sand, but there was an abundance of grass upon them, and they were somewhat elevated above the more alluvial flats near the creek.  At 2 1/2 miles we crossed a large tributary from the N.E., the main branch trended to the N.W., and we kept the belt of trees in view as we rode along, during the greater part of the day.  At seven miles we descended a little from the grassy plains to a flooded plain of considerable extent, but again rose from it to the sandy level, and finding a small puddle of rain water at 36 miles I halted.

As I was about to trust entirely to the supply of water left by the recent storm, and knew not to what distance it had extended, I felt it necessary to take every precaution to insure our retreat.  We worked, therefore, by the light of the moon, and dug a square pit, into which we drained all the water that remained after the horses had satisfied themselves in the morning, but the quantity was so small that I scarcely hoped to derive any advantage from it on our return; and it was really the zeal of Morgan and Mack that induced me to allow them to finish it.  Warm as the weather had been at Fort Grey, the night was bitterly cold, with the wind from the S.S.E.  We left this, our first well, at early dawn, riding across a continuation of the same grassy and sandy land as that we had journeyed over the day before, only that it had many bare patches upon it full of water, the undersoil being a red clay.  The same kind of tree we had seen to the eastward, between the old Depot and the Darling, and which I had there taken to be a species of Juglans, prevailed hereabouts in sheltered places.

The creek line of trees was was still visible to our left, so that it must have come up a little more to the north.  We crossed several native paths leading to it:  the impression of an enormous foot was on one of them.  At eight miles we descended to a flooded plain, scattered over with stunted box-trees, the greater number being dead, and I may remark that we generally found such to be the case on lands of a similar description; a fact, it appears to me, that can only be accounted for from the long-continued drought to which these unhappy regions are subject.  These flooded plains are generally torn to pieces by cracks of four, six, and eight feet deep, of a