Yours very truly,
HENRY BARKLY.
Government Offices, Melbourne, 25th November, 1861.
P.S.--After I had finished my letter, I received a memorandum from the Surveyor-General respecting Mr. Wills's astronomical observations, which is of so much importance that I enclose it for your information, not having time to get a copy made.
H.B.
It has been remarked, with some disposition to draw uncharitable conclusions therefrom, that no religious expressions, or any specific references to that all-important subject, are to be found in the field-books and journals that have been given to the public. On this point, King said, in reply to Question 1714, "I wish to state, with regard to there being no particular tokens of religion recorded in any part of the diaries, that we each had our Bible and Prayer-book, and occasionally read them going and coming back; and also the evening before the death of Mr. Burke, I am happy to say, he prayed to God for forgiveness for the past, and died happy, a sincere Christian."
The curtain drops here on the history of the great Victorian Exploring Expedition, and little more remains to be told of its results or shortcomings. The continent was crossed, the Gulf reached, and the road indicated by the hardy pioneers, which their successors will find it comparatively easy to level and macadamize. Already the stimulant of the Burke and Wills catastrophe has called into active exercise the successive expeditions and discoveries of Howitt, Norman, Walker, Landsborough, and McKinlay. Others will rapidly follow, with the characteristic energy and perseverance of the Saxon race. Now that time has, to a certain extent, allayed the poignant grief of those who are most nearly and dearly interested in the fate of the original explorers; when first impulses have cooled down, and the excitement of personal feelings has given way before unquestionable evidence, we may safely ascribe, as far as human agencies are concerned, the comparative failure of the enterprise to the following specific causes:--
1. The double mistake on the part of the leader, of dividing and subdividing his forces at Menindie and Cooper's Creek;
2. The utter unfitness of Wright for the position in which he was placed;