or answer for the changes in so extraordinary a region.  I only state my own ideas from what I observed, strengthened by my view of the position I occupied, when at my farthest north; we will therefore refer to that position, and to the position of Lake Torrens, and see how far it is probable, that a large channel, such as I have described the Stony Dessert to be, should turn so abruptly, as it must do to connect itself with that basin; the evident fall of the interior, as far as that fact could be ascertained, being plainly from east to west.

The western shore of Lake Torrens, as laid down by Mr. Eyre, is in 137 degrees 40 minutes or thereabouts.  Its eastern shore in 141 degrees of longitude.  Its southern extremity being in lat. 28 1/2 degrees.  My position was in 138 degrees of long. and 24 degrees 40 minutes of latitude.  I was therefore within 20 miles as far to the westward of the westernmost part of Lake Torrens, and was also 250 geographical miles due north of it.  To gain Lake Torrens, the Stony Desert must turn at a right angle from its known course, and in such case hills must exist to the westward of where I was, for hills alone could so change the direction of a current, but the whole aspect of the interior would argue against such a conclusion.  I never lost sight of the probability of Lake Torrens being connected with some central feature, until my hopes were destroyed by the nature of the country I traversed, nor do I think it probable that in so level a region as that in which I left it, there is any likelihood of the Stony Desert changing its direction so much as to form any connection with the sandy basin to which I have alluded.  Nevertheless it may do so.  We naturally cling to the ideas we ourselves have adopted, and it is difficult to transfer them to the mind of another.  In reference however to what I had previously stated, I would give the following quotation from Flinders.  His impressions from what he observed while sailing along the coast, in a great measure correspond with mine when travelling inland, the only point we differ upon is as to the probable origin of the great sea-wall, which appeared to him to be of calcareous formation, and he therefore concluded that it had been a coral reef raised by some convulsion of nature.  Had Capt.  Flinders been able to examine the rock formation of the Great Australian Bight, he would have found that it was for the most part an oolitic limestone, with many shells imbedded in it, similar in substance and in formation to the fossil bed of the Murray, but differing from it in colour.

“The length of these cliffs from their second commencement is 33 leagues, and that of the level bank from New Cape Paisley, where it was first seen from the sea, no less than 145 leagues.  The height of this extraordinary bank is nearly the same throughout, being nowhere less by estimation than 400 feet, not anywhere more than 600.  In the first 20 leagues the rugged tops of some inland mountains were visible over it, but during the remainder of its long course, the bank was the limit of our view.