The Stomach Of The Emu Was Full Of A Small Plant Resembling
Chickweed, Which Grew Round The Water-Holes.
The smoke of the natives' fires was seen to the south and south-west.
July 5. - We travelled over full twenty miles of country, although the
distance from camp to camp, in a straight line, did not exceed fourteen,
in a south by west direction; the latitude of our new camp was 16 degrees
27 minutes 26 seconds. After passing several miles of tea-tree forest,
intermixed with box, and alternating with belts of grassy forest land,
with bloodwood and Nonda, we entered upon a series of plains increasing
in size, and extending to the westward as far as the eye could reach, and
separated from each other by narrow strips of forest; they were
well-grassed, but the grasses were stiff. Tea-tree hollows extended along
the outskirts of the plains. In one of them, we saw Salicornia for the
first time, which led us to believe that the salt water was close at
hand. Having crossed the plains, we came to broad sheets of sand,
overgrown with low shrubby tea-trees, and a species of Hakea, which
always grows in the vicinity of salt water. The sands were encrusted with
salt, and here and there strewed with heaps of Cytherea shells. Beyond
the sands, we saw a dense green line of mangrove trees extending along a
salt water creek, which we headed, and in which Brown speared the first
salt water mullet.
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