August 10.—Proceeded on our journey: our course for the first six or seven miles being to the north-north-east, and afterwards north-east half east, which latter course I intended to steer for some time. It was the best day's travelling we had experienced since quitting the Macquarie River, being generally over low strong ridges, the sides and summits of some of which were very thick brush of cypress trees, and small shrubs, particularly the last two miles. We stopped for the evening in an extensive low valley north of Mount Exmouth, and running under its base, bounded on the north-east by low forest hills. To the south the hills were rocky, abrupt, and precipitous. On the whole we accomplished eleven miles.
August 11.—Our route lay over low valleys of considerable extent of open forest ground, but so soft and boggy, that it was with difficulty we made any progress: it would seem that much rain had fallen here lately, and completely saturated the soil, which is a light, sandy mould. In these valleys there are small streams of water, having their origin in the surrounding hills; they all terminate northerly. We could accomplish but seven miles on a north-east by east course. In the evening we had an awful storm of thunder and lightning, accompanied with torrents of rain. The reverberation of sound among the hills was astonishing. The natives continue in our vicinity unheeded, and unheeding: even the noise of their mogo upon the trees is a relief from the otherwise utter loneliness of feeling we cannot help experiencing in these desolate wilds.
August 12.—We found that we could not maintain our direct course, as the low ground was so boggy, that the horses were altogether unable to move on it. Keeping therefore the banks of the little stream where the ground was firmer, we reached the chain of hills bounding the valley to the southward: we wound along the base of the hills on a variety of courses, not being able to quit them twenty yards without being bogged. Finding that the hills trended too much to the south-west, we kept down the bed of a small stream for two or three miles, and halted on a fine apple tree flat of rich land, watered by a very fine small stream, which was joined by the one we came down. The main strewn ran to the northward. The apple tree flats are uniformly of firm hard ground, while the soil on which grow the iron-bark, pine, and box, is as invariably a loose sand, rendered by the rain a perfect quicksand. These bogs are the more provoking, as without such impediments the country is clear and open, and as favourable for travelling over as could be wished: we have had any thing but a dry season, and it is to the heavy rain which might naturally be expected to fall near high mountains, that our present difficulties must be ascribed. We travelled between nine and ten miles, but our course made good was nearly south-east only five miles. A few new plants were found: the hills were a mere bed of iron ore.
August 13.—We proceeded at our usual hour; and did not halt till near sunset, but accomplished no more than six miles, in the course of which the horses were obliged to be unladen, and the men carried the loads upwards of half a mile before the horses could be got across the quicksands. They are indeed properly so termed, consisting of two or three inches of light mould, on about eighteen inches of loose sand, the whole covering a rocky or stony bottom. On treading on them, water would fly up several inches; and it was with difficulty men could pass over them, much less horses. Quicksands of a similar nature prevented our reaching a small creek running under a high craggy ridge of hills; we therefore stopped at the edges of them, every body completely worn out. The appearance of the country passed over was most desolate and forbidding, but quite open, interspersed with miserable rocky crags, on which grew the cypress and eucalyptus. On the more level portions of the country, a new and large species of eucalyptus, and another of its genus (the iron bark), were the principal if not the only trees. Many of the rocks were pointed and basaltic, but the general species was a coarse sandstone. Miserable as the country was in other respects, it was fruitful in new plants.
August 14.—As it rained hard during the night, and the rain still continued to fall in thick showers, I thought it advisable to rest.
August 15.—Cloudy, with strong winds from the south-east. We crossed the creek about two miles from our resting-place, but soon found that any attempt to advance in that quarter would be abortive, the morass and quicksands extending into the very water, and denying all egress. We therefore recrossed the rivulet about a mile more northerly with better success, and succeeded in gaining some stony hills, which, with two or three intervening marshy valleys, continued for the rest of the day's route; the latter part being up very high, rocky, barren hills, with narrow defiles. From these heights we descended into a pretty valley of considerable extent, and, to our great joy, of sound, firm soil, with plenty of good grass: the water however was strongly impregnated with iron, so that we could hardly drink it. This valley, which we named Wiltden Valley, was enclosed on all sides except the north, by lofty, rocky hills of coarse sandstone, adorned with various species of acacia in full bloom, with a vast variety of other flowering shrubs of the most beautiful and delicate description, adding greatly to our botanical collection. We accomplished in the whole twelve or thirteen miles, about six of which were in the direction of our proper course.
August 16.—We had hardly begun to lade the horses, when the rain recommenced with greater violence than in the night, and effectually prevented us from proceeding. The country presents sufficient obstructions to our progress, not to render the delay caused by a day's rain a matter of much inquietude. The loss of time is of little consideration, when compared with the soft and boggy ground which such heavy falls leave. A species of banksia was seen to-day under the same meridian as on the Macquarie. It would seem that particular productions of the vegetable as well as of the mineral kingdom run in veins nearly north and south through the country. This peculiarity has been remarked of other plants, besides the species of banksia.
August 17.—Our course this day led us over a barren, rocky country, consisting of low stony ranges, divided by valleys of pure sand, and usually wet and marshy: latterly we appear to be descending from a considerable height, to a lower country to the north-east. The whole was a mere scrub covered with dwarf iron barks, apple trees, and small gums; the soil scarcely any thing but sand, on which grass grew in single detached roots. The horses fell repeatedly in the course of the day, and they were now so weak that they sank at every soft place. Between four and five o'clock, after travelling about ten hours, we stopped at a small drain of water for the night, having accomplished nearly eleven miles. In our track we saw no signs of natives, and the country seemed abandoned of every living thing. Silence and desolation reigned around.
August 18.—It is impossible to describe in adequate language the different trying obstructions we encountered during this day's journey: after meeting and overcoming many minor difficulties of bog and quicksand, we had accomplished nearly eleven miles, and were looking out for a place to rest, when we entered a very thick forest of small iron barks which had been lately burnt; and their black stems and branches, with the dull bluish colour of their foliage, gave the whole a singularly dismal and gloomy appearance. So thick was the forest that we could hardly turn our horses, nor could the sun's rays penetrate to the sandy desert on which these trees grew. Without the usual appearances of a bog, our horses were in an instant up to their bellies, and the difficulties we had in extricating them would hardly obtain belief. In this dilemma, scarcely able to see which way to turn, we traversed the margin of this extensive quicksand for nearly three miles in a direction contrary to our course, before we could find firm ground or water for the horses, which we did not effect till sunset; and then (as for the last three days) there was nothing for them to eat but prickly grass, which possesses no nourishing qualities. This fare, after their hard labour, reduces them daily.
August 19.—After wandering about the whole day without gaining any thing on our course, for the quicksands kept us revolving as it were in a circle, the exhaustion of the horses obliged us to stop. It was painful to behold them, after being disencumbered of their loads, lay themselves down like dogs about us: it was the fourth day that they had been without grass, and they preferred the tender branches of shrubs, etc., to the prickly grass. The backs of the greater part of them were, notwithstanding every care, dreadfully galled, so that they could, when first saddled, scarcely stand under their burdens. These quicksands lie in the hollows between the low irregular hills, which rise on this otherwise level country: their point of discharge is uniformly north-westerly. The union of many of these minor drains forms occasionally a large one, and the points of the hills which meet upon them afford the only means of crossing them. It was evident that the early part of the winter had been very wet., and the late rains had probably been the cause of these morasses, which still continued to drain themselves off in running water. This region must at all times be impassable from opposite causes: in wet seasons it is a bog; in dry ones, there is no water. Finding, as above remarked, that northerly and north-east the country declined as it were to nothing, it was resolved to pursue a more easterly course than that hitherto followed; and instead of attempting to go round the morasses which we might meet with to the north, to follow them southerly, a course which in time must certainly take us to a more elevated country. Such a road is rendered now absolutely necessary by the condition of the horses. Our dogs, which had so long contributed to our support, had been for the last four days dependant upon us for theirs, and we were too much indebted to their exertions not to share our meals with them with cheerfulness. These woods abound with kangaroo rats, and it is singular that, pinched as the dogs were, they would not touch them even when cooked.