To have stopped where we were, would, therefore, have been impossible; to have advanced, would probably have been ruin. Had there been one favorable circumstance to have encouraged me with the hope of success, I would have proceeded. Had we picked up a stone as indicating our approach to high land, I would have gone on; or had there been a break in the level of the country, or even a change in the vegetation. But we had left all traces of the natives far behind us; and this seemed a desert they never entered—that not even a bird inhabited. I could not encourage a hope of success, and, therefore, gave up the point; not from want of means, but a conviction of the inutility of any further efforts. If there is any blame to be attached to the measure, it is I who am in fault, but none who had not like me traversed the interior at such a season, would believe the state of the country over which
I had wandered. During the short interval I had been out, I had seen rivers cease to flow before me, and sheets of water disappear; and had it not been for a merciful Providence, should, ere reaching the Darling, have been overwhelmed by misfortune.
I am giving no false picture of the reality. So long had the drought continued, that the vegetable kingdom was almost annihilated, and minor vegetation had disappeared. In the creeks, weeds had grown and withered, and grown again; and young saplings were now rising in their beds, nourished by the moisture that still remained; but the largest forest trees were drooping, and many were dead. The emus, with outstretched necks, gasping for breath, searched the channels of the rivers for water, in vain; and the native dog, so thin that it could hardly walk, seemed to implore some merciful hand to despatch it. How the natives subsisted it was difficult to say, but there was no doubt of the scarcity of food among them.
We arrived in camp at a late hour, and having nothing to detain us longer, prepared for our retreat in the morning. The natives had remained with the party during the greater part of the day, and had only left them a short time prior to our arrival.
When examining the creek on which we had been encamped for some days, Mr. Hume observed a small junction; and as we knew we were almost due N. of the marshes of the Macquarie, both of us were anxious to
ascertain whence it originated. To return to Mount Harris, by retracing our steps up the Castlereagh, would have entailed the severest distress upon us; we the rather preferred proceeding up this creek, and taking our chance for a supply of water. We therefore crossed Morrisset's chain of ponds, and encamped in the angle formed by the junction of the two creeks.
Before we left this position, we were visited by a party of natives, twelve in number, but not of the Darling tribe. They accompanied us a short way, and then struck off to the right. At about a mile and a half, we crossed Mr. Hume's track, leading westerly, which still remained observable. The creek was, no doubt, the hollow he stated that he crossed on that excursion, and its appearance certainly justified his opinion of it. Its bed was choked up with bulrushes or the polygonum, and its banks were level with the country on either side, or nearly so. We passed over extremely rich soil the whole day, on a S.W. and by W. course, though the timber upon it was dwarfish, and principally of the rough-gum kind.
On the 2nd of April, we stopped in order to make some repairs upon the dray; the wheels of which had failed us. Clayton put in four new spokes, and we heated the tyres over again, by which means we got it once more serviceable.
The soil in the creek was of the richest quality, and was found to produce a dwarf melon, having all the habits and character of the cucumber. The fruit was not larger than a pigeon's egg, but was extremely sweet. There were not,
however, many ripe, although the runners were covered with flowers, and had an abundance of fruit upon them. In the morning, we sent the tinker on horseback up the creek, to ascertain how far the next water was from us, desiring him to keep the creek upon his right, and to follow his own track back again. He thought fit, however, considering himself a good bushman, to wander away to his left, and the consequence was, that he soon lost himself. It would appear that he doubled and passed through some thick brush at the back of the camp, and at length found himself at dark on the banks of a considerable creek. In wandering along it, he luckily struck upon the natives we had last seen, who, good-naturedly, led him to the track of the dray, which his horse would not afterwards desert, and the tinker sneaked into the tent about 3 o'clock in the morning, having failed in his errand, and made himself the butt of the whole party.