M'Kinlay next sent Mr. Hodgkinson with men and packhorses to Blanche Water, to take down the news of his discovery, and to bring back rations for a prolonged exploration. Meantime he remained in camp. From one old native, with whom he had a long conversation, he obtained another version of the supposed massacre, which evidently had a certain admixture of truth.
This was to the effect that the whites repulsed an attack of the natives on their return journey; that in the affair, one white man was killed; he was buried after the fight, and the others went south. The natives then dug up the body and ate the flesh. The blackfellow then described minutely the different waters passed by Burke, and the way the men lived on the seeds of the nardoo plant, which he must have heard of from other natives.
After waiting a little over a month, Mr. Hodgkinson returned, and brought back with him the news of Howitt's success in finding King. This explained M'Kinlay's discovery as being that of Gray's body, the adjuncts of the fight turning out to be exaggerations of the natives. He made an excursion to the eastward, and visited the graves of the two men buried by Howitt, on Cooper's Creek, then he started for the north.
The perusal of his journal, containing the account of his first few weeks' travel, is hard work to accomplish. The native names of every small lake and waterhole are all given in full, and as the course of each day's travel is omitted, it becomes rather difficult to follow the track of the expedition, excepting on the map.
A fairly northerly course was, however, maintained, and M'Kinlay speaks highly of the country for pastoral purposes. As it was the dry time of the year, immediately preceding the setting in of the rains, it shows what a severe season must have been encountered by Sturt when on his last struggle north, as that explorer finally turned his-back in much the same locality.
On the 27th of February, heavy rains set in, fortunately, they were in the neighbourhood of some stony ridges and sand hills, on which they camped, and where they had plenty of space to feed their animals, although surrounded by water.
On March 10th, they started again, and steadily continued north through good travelling country, keeping back from the main creek, which was now too flooded and boggy to follow. This large creek, which was called by M'Kinlay the Mueller, is one of the main rivers of the interior, now known as the Diamantina. M'Kinlay soon kept more to the westward and crossed the stony range, which bears his name, in much the same place that Burke and Wills did. He christened many of the large tributaries of the inland watershed, but most of his names have been replaced by others, it having been difficult to determine them, as in many cases, the creeks he named were but anabranches.
The history of their progress is now monotonous in the extreme, the country through which they travelled presented no great obstacle to the travellers' advance, being well-grassed and watered; and finally on the 6th May they reached the Leichhardt River.
M'Kinlay was most anxious to get to the mouth of the Albert, it being understood that Captain Norman with the steamer Victoria, would there form a depôt for the use of the other explorers, Landsborough and Walker, and M'Kinlay's stock of rations was getting perilously low.
His attempts to reach the sea were, however, fruitless. He was continually turned back by deep and broad mangrove creeks and boggy flats, and on the 21st May the party started for the nearest settled districts in Queensland, in the direction of Port Denison.