Measured the altitude of a hill above its base and found it to be 222 feet.
March 8.
Measured the altitude of a hill above its base and found it to be 229.5 feet.
None of these hills had apparently near so great an elevation as the sandstone range of which they were under-features. At this period our barometer was unfortunately broken. We now proceeded up the banks of the Glenelg and arrived at many hills and conical peaks, apparently much higher than those I had measured; yet on afterwards passing the river and attaining the summit of the opposite sandstone range, we looked down upon them as hills of far inferior elevation to those on which we stood. From this circumstance, and from the very perceptible change of temperature we experienced, I should think the altitude of the farthest point of Stephen's Range which we reached must have been 2,500 or 3,000 feet above the sea.
CHARACTER OF THE RIVERS.
The rivers in North-western Australia much resemble in character those of the south-eastern parts of the continent. They rise at no very great distance from the sea. Near their sources they are mountain torrents, but in the lowlands they become generally streams with slow currents, winding through fertile and extensive valleys or plains which are liable to sudden and terrific inundations, caused, I conceive, by the rain which falls in that part of the mountains where the rivers take their rise; for at one period, when we had our encampment on the bank of the small stream near the sea at Hanover Bay, I was myself distant about fourteen miles in the interior in the direction of its source, where we had heavy rain; and on my return I found that the party at the station had been surprised by a sudden rising of the water for which there was no apparent cause as there had been no rain where they were.
The Glenelg River, in like manner, is subject to sweeping inundations, rising sometimes to the height of fourteen to fifteen feet above its usual level, as was evinced by the weeds and other substances we saw in the trees on its banks.
To show that these are characteristics of the Fitzroy River I shall quote the authority of Captain Wickham from a letter addressed to me just before our meeting at Hanover Bay:
It (the Fitzroy) appears to be very similar to the rivers on the south-east side of New Holland, subject to dreadful inundations, caused by heavy floods in the interior, and in no way connected with the rainy season on the coast. Our visit to it being in February and March, immediately after the rainy season on the coast, without our seeing any indication of a recent flooding, although there were large trunks of trees and quantities of grass and weeds lying on the bank and suspended from the branches of trees from ten to twelve feet above the level of the river. The bed is entirely of sand.