Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia Part 7

August 25.--Slight showers during the night, and the day dark and cloudy, with rather an oppressive atmosphere. The horses had strayed during the night, so that it was nine o'clock before we got away.

We had scarcely left the place of encampment, when shoutings were heard, and signal fires lit up in every direction by the natives, to give warning I imagine of our being abroad, and to call stragglers to their camp. These people had still remained in our immediate vicinity, and were now a.s.sembled in very considerable numbers on the brow of one of the front ridges, to watch us pa.s.s by. They would not approach us, but as the drays moved on kept running in a line with them, at some distance, and occasionally shouting and gesticulating in an unintelligible manner.

In our first and only intercourse with these natives, we had unfortunately given them just cause of offence, and I was most anxious, if possible, before leaving, to efface the unfavourable impression which they had received. Letting the drays therefore move on, I remained behind with Mr. Scott, leading our horses, and trying to induce some of the natives to come up to us; for a long time, however, our efforts were in vain, but at last I succeeded in persuading a fine athletic looking man to approach within a moderate distance; I then shewed him a tomahawk, which I laid on the ground, making signs that I intended it for him. When I had retired a little, he went and took it up, evidently comprehending its use, and appearing much pleased with the gift; the others soon congregated around him, and Mr. Scott and I mounting our horses, followed the party, leaving the sable council to discuss the merits of their new acquisition, and hoping that the unfavourable opinion with which we had at first impressed them, would be somewhat modified for the future.

Steering N. 43 degrees W. for five miles, and then winding through the range, in the bed of a watercourse to the plains on the other side, we took a direction of E. 20 degrees N. for fifteen miles, arriving about dark upon a small channel that I had crossed on the 14th of August. Here was good feed for the horses, and plenty of water a little way up among the hills. This watercourse I had not examined when I was here before, preferring to trace up the larger one beyond instead. Had I followed this, I should easily have found water, and been relieved from much of the anxiety which I had then undergone.

In travelling through a country previously unexplored, no pains should be spared in examining every spot, even the most unlikely, where it is possible for water to exist, for after searching in vain, in large deep rocky and likely looking watercourses, I have frequently found water in some small branch or gorge, that had appeared too insignificant, or too uninviting to require to be explored. This I named The Mundy, after my friend, Alfred Mundy, Esq., now the Colonial Secretary of South Australia.

Early this morning, I took Mr. Scott with me, to examine The Mundy, leaving the overseer to proceed with the party.

After entering the hills a short distance, we found in the bed of the Mundy a strongly running stream, connecting several reaches of waters, upon which many black ducks were sailing about. This appeared to be one of the finest and best streams we had yet discovered, although the water was slightly impregnated with alum. After the watercourse left the hills, the surface water all disappeared, the drainage being then absorbed by the light sandy soil of the plains, and this had invariably been the case with all the waters emanating from Flinders range.

Crossing some stony ridges, we followed the party up the large watercourse, which I had traced so far on the 5th of August, since named the Burr, after the Deputy Surveyor-general of the colony, and at nineteen miles halted early in the afternoon, at some springs rising among rocks and rushes in its bed. The water was very brackish, though drinkable, but did not extend far on either side of the spot we were encamped at, and when after dinner, I took a long walk up the watercourse to search for more, I was unable to find any either in the main channel or its branches. The gra.s.s was abundant and good. The lat.i.tude of the camp I ascertained to be 30 degrees 27 minutes S.

August 27.--Having risen and breakfasted very early, I took Mr. Scott and a native boy with me, and steered for a very high hill with rather a rounded summit, bearing from our camp E. 17 degrees S. This I named Mount Serle, in accordance with a request made to me before my departure, by the Governor, that I would name some remarkable feature in the country after Mr. Serle. This was the most prominent object we had hitherto met with; among high ranges it appeared the highest, and from a height above our present encampment, it had been selected by us as the most likely point from which to obtain a view to the eastward.

The elevation of this hill could not be less than three thousand feet above the level of the sea; but unfortunately, the injury my barometer had sustained in the escape of some of the mercury, and my being unable to fill it again properly, quite precluded me from ascertaining the height with accuracy.

In our route to Mount Serle, we observed another hill rather more to the northward, seemingly of as great an alt.i.tude as Mount Serle itself; this was not situate in the Mount Serle range, nor had it been seen by us in our view from the height above the depot.

At ten miles from our camp, we came to a large watercourse, emanating from the Mount Serle range on the south side, and running close under its western aspect, with an abundance of excellent clear water in it. This I named the Frome, after the Surveyor-general of the colony, to whose kindness I was so much indebted in preparing my outfit and for the loan of instruments for the use of the expedition.

Having watered our horses we tied them up to some trees, and commenced the ascent of Mount Serle on foot. The day was exceedingly hot, and we found our task a much harder one than we had antic.i.p.ated, being compelled to wind up and down several steep and rugged ridges before we could reach the main one.

At length, however, having overcome all difficulties we stood upon the summit of the mountain. Our view was then extensive and final. At one glance I saw the realization of my worst forebodings; and the termination of the expedition of which I had the command. Lake Torrens now faced us to the east, whilst on every side we were hemmed in by a barrier which we could never hope to pa.s.s. Our toils and labours and privations, had all been endured to no purpose; and the only alternative left us would be to return, disappointed and baffled.

To the north and north-west the horizon was unbroken to the naked eye, but with the aid of a powerful telescope I could discover fragments of table land similar to those I had seen in the neighbourhood of the lake in that direction. At N. 8 degrees W. a very small hayc.o.c.k-looking hill might be seen above the level waste, probably the last of the low spurs of Flinders range to the north. To the north-east, the view was obstructed by a high range immediately in front of us, but to the east and as far as E. 13 degrees S. we saw through a break in the hills, a broad glittering belt in appearance, like the bed of a lake, but apparently dry.

The ranges seemed to continue to the eastward of Mount Serle for about fifteen miles, and then terminated abruptly in a low, level, scrubby-looking country, also about fifteen miles in extent, between the hills and the borders of the lake. The latter appearing about twenty-five miles across, whilst beyond it was a level region without a height or elevation of any kind.

Connecting the view before me with the fact that on the 14th August, when in about lat. 29 degrees S., I had found Lake Torrens turning round to the north-east, and had observed no continuation of Flinders range to the eastward of my position, I could now no longer doubt that I had almost arrived at the termination of that range, and that the glittering belt I now saw to the east, was in fact only an arm of the lake taking the drainage from its eastern slopes.

Sad and painful were the thoughts that occupied my mind in returning to the camp. Hitherto, even when placed in the most difficult or desperate circ.u.mstances I was cheered by hope, but now I had no longer even that frail solace to cling to, there was no mistaking the nature of the country, by which we were surrounded on every side, and no room for doubting its impracticability.

Chapter VII.

EXCURSION TO THE NORTH-EAST--TRACE DOWN THE FROME--WATER BECOMES SALT--Pa.s.s BEYOND THE RANGES--c.o.c.kATOOS SEEN--HEAVY RAINS--DRY WATER-COURSES--MOUNT DISTANCE--BRINE SPRINGS--MOUNT HOPELESS--TERMINATION OF FLINDERS RANGE--LAKE TORRENS TO THE NORTH AND TO THE EAST--ALL FURTHER ADVANCE HOPELESS--YOUNG EMUS CAUGHT--REJOIN PARTY--MOVE BACK TOWARDS MOUNT ARDEN--LOSS OF A HORSE--ARRIVE AT THE DEPOT--PLANS FOR THE FUTURE--TAKE UP STORES--PREPARE FOR LEAVING.

Upon returning to the depot at the Burr, I decided upon making an excursion to the north-east, to ascertain the actual termination of Flinders range, and the nature of the prospect beyond it; not to satisfy myself, for a single glance from the eminence I had recently occupied at Mount Serle, had for ever set my curiosity at rest on these points, but in discharge of the duty I owed to the Governor, and the promoters of the expedition, who could not be expected to be satisfied with a bare conjecture on a subject which they had sent me practically to demonstrate, however fairly from circ.u.mstances the conclusions might be deduced at which I had been compelled to arrive. Accordingly, on the morning of the 29th, I took with me my overseer, one man, a native boy, and a cart drawn by three horses to carry water; and making an early start, proceeded to attempt for the last time to penetrate into those regions of gloom.

After travelling ten miles, we arrived at the Frome, where we watered and fed the horses. From this place I sent the overseer on before us, to see how far the water extended, that we might determine where to fix our halting-place for the night. After resting awhile we proceeded on with the cart, tracing down the watercourse over a very rough and stony road on which the cart was upset, but without any serious damage, and pa.s.sing several very large and fine water-holes with many teal and wood-duck upon them.

At eight miles from where we lunched, we encamped with abundance of water, but very little gra.s.s. The lat.i.tude by meridian alt.i.tude of Altair was 30 degrees 18 minutes 30 seconds S. In the evening the overseer returned, and stated there was water for nine miles further, but that the road was very rocky and bad.

August 30.--Leaving the overseer to bring on the cart, I rode on a-head down the watercourse to trace the continuance of the water. The road I found to be very bad, and at twenty-three miles, upon tasting the water I found it as salt as the sea, and the bed of the creek quite impracticable for a cart; I therefore hurried back for seven miles, and halted the party at the last good water-hole, which was about sixteen miles from our yesterday's camp.

We had seen many ducks during the day, two of which I shot, and the black boy found a nest with fresh eggs in it, so that we fared more luxuriously than usual. The night set in very dark and windy, but no rain fell.

August 31.--This morning I sent the overseer back to the depot with the cart and two horses, whilst I and the native boy proceeded on our route on horseback, taking also a man leading a pack-horse to carry water for us the first day. Following down the watercourse, we pa.s.sed through some imposing scenery, consisting of cliffs from six to eight hundred feet in height, rising perpendicularly from their bases, below which were recesses, into which the sun never shone, and whose gloomy grandeur imparted a melancholy cast to the thoughts and feelings, in unison with the sublimity of the scene around.

After travelling twelve miles from the camp, we got clear of the hills, and found an open country before us to the north; through this we proceeded for ten miles further, still following the direction of the watercourse, and halting upon it for the night, after having made a stage of twenty-two miles. We had tolerable gra.s.s for the horses, but were obliged to give them water from the kegs.

At this place I was much astonished to see four white c.o.c.katoos, flying about among the gum-trees in the watercourse, and immediately commenced a narrow search for water, as I knew those birds did not frequently go far away from it: there was not, however, a drop to be found anywhere, nor the least sign of there having been any for a long time. What made the circ.u.mstance of finding c.o.c.katoos here so surprising and unusual was, that for the last two hundred miles we had never seen one at all. Where then had these four birds come from? could it be that they had followed under Flinders range from the south, and had strayed so far away from all others of their kind, or had they come from some better country beyond the desert by which I was surrounded, or how was that country to be attained, supposing it to exist? Time only may reply to these queries, but the occasion which prompted them was, to say the least, extraordinary.

Towards night the sky became overcast with clouds, and as I saw that we should have rain, I set to work with the boy and made a house of boughs for our protection, but the man who accompanied us was too indolent to take the same precaution, thinking probably that the rain would pa.s.s away as it had often done before. In this, however, he was disappointed, for the rain came down in torrents [Note 7 at end para.]--in an hour or two the whole country was inundated, and he was taught a lesson of industry at the expense of a thorough and unmitigated drenching.

[Note 7: This will not appear surprising, when the great amount of rain which falls annually in some parts of Australia, is taken into account.

The Count Strzelecki gives 62.68 inches, as the average annual fall for upwards of twenty years, at Port Macquarie.--At p. 193, that gentleman remarks:--"The greatest fall of rain recorded in New South Wales, during 24 hours, amounted to 25 inches. (Port Jackson)."]

September 1.--This morning I sent the man back to the depot with the pack-horse, with orders to the overseer to move back the party as rapidly as possible towards Mount Arden, that by taking advantage of the rain we might make a short route through the plains, and avoid the necessity of going up among the rugged and stony watercourses of the hills.

This retrograde movement was rendered absolutely necessary from our present position, for since we had wound through the hills to the north, and come out upon the open plains, I saw that Flinders range had terminated, and I now only wished to trace its northern termination so far east as to enable me to see round it to the southward, as well as to ascertain the character and appearance of the country to the north and to the east; as soon therefore as the man had left, I proceeded at a course of E. 35 degrees N. for a low and very distant elevation, apparently the last of the hills to the eastward, this I named Mount Distance, for it deceived us greatly as to the distance we were from it.

In pa.s.sing through the plains, which were yesterday so arid and dry, I found immense pools, nay almost large reaches of water lodged in the hollows, and in which boats might have floated. Such was the result of only an hour or two's rain, whilst the ground itself, formerly so hard, was soft and boggy in the extreme, rendering progress much slower and more fatiguing to the horses than it otherwise would have been. By steadily persevering we made a stage of thirty-five miles, but were obliged to encamp at night some miles short of the little height I had been steering for.

During our ride we pa.s.sed several dry watercourses at five, ten, twenty-five, thirty, and thirty-five miles from our last encampment. The last we halted upon with good feed for the horses, and rainwater lodged everywhere. All these watercourses took their course to the north, emptying and losing themselves in the plains. In the evening heavy showers again fell, and the night set in very dark.

September 2.--After travelling seven miles we ascended Mount Distance, and from it I could see that the hills now bore S. and S.E. and were getting much lower, so that we were rapidly rounding their northern extremity. To the north and north-east were seen only broken fragments of table lands, similar to what I found near the lake to the north-west; the lake itself, however, was nowhere visible, and I saw that I should have another day's hard riding before I could satisfactorily determine its direction. Upon descending I steered for a distant low hayc.o.c.k-like peak in the midst of one of the table-topped fragments; from this rise I expected the view would be decisive, and I named it Mount Hopeless.--From Mount Distance it bore E. 25 degrees N.

Crossing many little stony ridges, and pa.s.sing the channel of several watercourses, I discovered a new and still more disheartening feature in the country, the existence of brine springs. Hitherto we had found brackish and occasionally salt water in some of the watercourses, but by tracing them up among the hills, we had usually found the quality to improve as we advanced, but now the springs were out in the open plains, and the water poisoned at its very source.

Occasionally round the springs were a few coa.r.s.e rushes, but the soil in other respects was quite bare, dest.i.tute of vegetation, and thickly coated over with salt, presenting the most miserable and melancholy aspect imaginable. We were now in nearly the same lat.i.tude as that in which Captain Sturt had discovered brine springs in the bed of the Darling, and which had rendered even that river so perfectly salt that his party could not make use of it.

September 2.--At thirty-five miles we reached the little elevation I had been steering for, and ascended Mount Hopeless, and cheerless and hopeless indeed was the prospect before us. As I had antic.i.p.ated, the view was both extensive and decisive. We were now past all the ranges; and for three quarters of the compa.s.s, extending from south, round by east and north, to west, the horizon was one unbroken level, except where the fragments of table land, or the ridge of the lake, interrupted its uniformity

The lake was now visible to the north and to the east; and I had at last ascertained, beyond all doubt, that its basin, commencing near the head of Spencer's Gulf, and following the course of Flinders range (bending round its northern extreme to the southward), const.i.tuted those hills the termination of the island of South Australia, for such I imagine it once to have been. This closed all my dreams as to the expedition, and put an end to an undertaking from which so much was antic.i.p.ated. I had now a view before me that would have damped the ardour of the most enthusiastic, or dissipated the doubts of the most seeptical. To the showers that fell on the evening of the 31st of August, we were solely indebted for having been able to travel thus far; had there been much more rain the country would have been impracticable for horses,--if less we could not have procured water to have enabled us to make such a push as we had done.

The lake where it was visible, appeared, as it had ever done, to be from twenty-five to thirty miles across, and its distance from Mount Hopeless was nearly the same. The hills to the S. and S. W. of us, seemed to terminate on the eastern slopes, as abruptly as on the western; and from the point where we stood, we could distinctly trace by the gum-trees, the direction of watercourses emanating from among them, taking northerly, north-easterly, easterly and south-easterly courses, according to the point of the range they came from. This had been the case during the whole of our route under Flinder's range. We had at first found the watercourses going to the south of west, then west, north-west, north, and now north-east, east and south-east. I had, at the same time, observed all around this mountain ma.s.s, the appearance of the bed of a large lake, following the general course of the ranges on every side, and receiving, apparently, the whole drainage from them.

On its western, and north-western sh.o.r.es, I had ascertained by actual examination, that its basin was a very low level, clearly defined, and effectually inclosed by an elevated continuous sandy ridge, like the outer boundary of a sea-sh.o.r.e, its area being of immense extent, and its bed of so soft and yielding a nature, as to make it quite impossible to cross it. All these points I had decided positively, and finally, as far as regards that part of Lake Torrens, from near the head of Spencer's Gulf, to the most north-westerly part of it, which I visited on the 14th of August, embracing a course of fully 200 miles in its outline. I had done this, too, under circ.u.mstances of great difficulty, toil, and anxiety, and not without the constant risk of losing my horses, from the fatigues and privations of the forced labours I was obliged to impose upon them.

Having ascertained these particulars, and at so much hazard, relative to Lake Torrens, for so great a part of its course, what conclusion could I arrive at with regard to the character of its other half to the north-east, and east of Flinders ranges, as seen from Mount Hopeless, and Mount Serle points, nearly ninety miles apart! The appearances from the ranges were similar; the trend of all the watercourses was to the same basin, and undoubtedly that basin, if traced far enough, must be of nearly the same level on the eastern, as on the western side of the ranges. I had completely ascertained that Flinders range had terminated to the eastward, the north-east, and the north; that there were no hills or elevations connected with it beyond, in any of these directions, and that the horizon every where was one low uninterrupted level.

With such data, and under such circ.u.mstances, what other opinion could I possibly arrive at, than that the bed of Lake Torrens was nearly similar in its character, and equally impracticable in its eastern, as its western arm; and that, considering the difficulties I had encountered, and the hazards I had subjected myself to, in ascertaining these points so minutely on the western side, I could not be justified in renewing those risks to the eastward, where the nature and extent of the impediments were so self-evidently the same, and where there was not the slightest hope of any useful result being attained by it.

I was now more than a hundred miles away from my party; and having sent them orders to move back towards Mount Arden, I had no time to lose in following them. With bitter feelings of disappointment I turned from the dreary and cheerless scene around me, and pushing the horses on as well as circ.u.mstances would allow, succeeded in retracing ten miles of my course by a little after dark, having completed a stage of fully forty-five miles during the day. Here there was tolerable good gra.s.s, and plenty of water from the late rains, so that the horses were more fortunate on this excursion than usual. I observed the variation to be 4 degrees E.

September 3.--Travelling early, we made a long stage of about forty miles, and encamped with good gra.s.s and water. During the day we caught four young emus in the plains, which we roasted for supper, being very hungry, and upon short allowance, as I had not calculated upon remaining out so long; the black boy enjoyed them exceedingly, and I managed to get through one myself. They were about the size of full grown fowls.

September 4.--Making a very early start, we travelled twenty miles to the watercourse, where we had encamped on the 31st of August, striking it a little lower down. As I had left one or two trifles here, that I wished to take on with me, I sent the black boy for them, telling him to follow my tracks while I went slowly on. Upon finding that he did not overtake me so soon as I expected, I halted for some time, but still he did not come up, and I again proceeded; for as I had left my former track, I concluded he had taken that line, and thus missed me. Steering, therefore, across the hills, some of which were very stony and broken, I made for the Mundy, which I reached very late in the evening, and found the party safely encamped there.