Whilst I was employed in digging a large square hole, to enable us to dip the bucket when watering the horses, the native boy went, accompanied by one of the natives as a guide, to look for grass.  Upon his return, he said he had been taken to a small plain about a mile away, behind the sand hills, where there was plenty of grass, though of a dry character; to this we sent the horses for the night.  In returning, a few sea fowl were shot as a present for our friends, with whom we encamped, gratified that we had at last surmounted the difficulty of rounding the Great Bight, and that once more we had a point where grass and water could be procured, and from which we might again make another push still further to the westward.

In the evening, we made many inquiries of the natives, as to the nature of the country inland, the existence of timber, rocks, water, etc. and though we were far from being able to understand all that they said, or to acquire half the information that they wished to convey to us, we still comprehended them sufficiently to gather many useful and important particulars.  In the interior, they assured us, most positively, there was no water, either fresh or salt, nor anything like a sea or lake of any description.

They did not misunderstand us, nor did we misapprehend them upon this point, for to our repeated inquiries for salt water, they invariably pointed to a salt lake, some distance behind the sand-hills, as the only one they knew of, and which at this time we had not seen.

With respect to hills or timber, they said, that neither existed inland, but that further along the coast to the westward, we should find trees of a larger growth, and among the branches of which lived a large animal, which by their description, I readily recognized as being the Sloth of New South Wales; an animal whose habits exactly agreed with their description, and which I knew to be an inhabitant of a barren country, where the scrub was of a larger growth than ordinary.  One of the natives had a belt round his waist, made of the fur of the animal they described, and on inspecting it, the colour and length of the hair bore out my previous impression.

The next water along the coast we were informed, was ten days journey from Yeerkumban kauwe, and was situated among sand-drifts, similar to those we were at, but beyond the termination of the line of cliffs, extending westward from the head of the Bight, and which were distinctly visible from the shore near our camp.  These cliffs they called, “Bundah,” and at two days’ journey from their commencement, they told us were procured the specimens of flints (Jula) we had seen upon their weapons, and of which one or two small pieces had been picked up by us among the sand-drifts, having probably been dropped there by the natives.