Observing a fine and extensive flat on the opposite side of the stream, which having been formerly burnt, was now covered with good grass, we crossed over at a place not ankle deep, and about six or eight feet wide, over a bottom of sand and stone, and halted for the evening; intending also to remain the ensuing day, to refresh the horses, as they had performed an excellent and continued week’s work, and much required it.

On reaching the present stream numerous cattle tracks were observed, and although not very recent, I do not think they were more than four or six months old, since the marks of young cattle were among them; it is probable they were those that have been missing for a length of time from the government herds at Cox’s River, and are now straying wild through this beautiful country, abounding in every thing that can tempt them to remain here.

The plants on the banks and in the stream were precisely similar to those on the Macquarie in the vicinity of Bathurst; but I have observed that no certain conclusions can be drawn from a similarity between the botanical productions of two places, a truth which has been exemplified more than once in the course of this Journal.

August 17.—­During the whole day the weather did not permit me to make the usual observations; it was not however uselessly passed, as the country was examined several miles to the north-east and east of our tents, and every report concurred as to the general beauty and goodness of the tracts passed over.  Mr. Evans and myself ascended a high grassy hill about a mile and a half north of the tent, and the prospect round was highly pleasing.  The general appearance of the country southerly made me still adhere to the opinion I entertained that the stream along which we were travelling would prove to derive its source from a very lofty range in that direction; whilst the Macquarie would be found still farther to the eastward, in which quarter I must have deceived myself greatly, if we do not find a stream superior to the present; and my hopes in that respect are much strengthened when I consider that we are not above fifty miles in a straight line from the spot where Mr. Evans left the Macquarie, a strong and powerful stream, and that too in a season as long and even longer dry than the present one.  In these hopes and expectations I shall continue an easterly course until nearly on the meridian of Bathurst, when they must either be realized, or the negative indisputably established, that there are no considerable rivers rising in the interior of New South Wales.  From the hill on which we stood, bearings were taken to the most remarkable objects, which were but few; for the country, as far as the eye could reach, was a continued series of low grassy hills and valleys; the whole thinly covered with wood, and in many places entirely bare of it.  The hills to the southward and south-west on the west side of the stream, and immediately bordering on it, were rocky and irregular; a few cypresses were growing on their sides and summits.  We named the hill on which we stood Mount Elizabeth, and the extensive flats or plains north of it, and on the east side of the stream, McArthur’s Plains.