PURPOSE - NOTES ON THE UNFAVOURABLE NATURE OF THE COUNTRY TO THE
WESTWARD, AND PROPOSAL THAT THE NORTHERN INTERIOR SHOULD BE EXAMINED
INSTEAD - MAKE AN OFFER TO THE GOVERNOR TO CONDUCT SUCH AN
EXPEDITION - CAPTAIN STURT'S LECTURE - INTERVIEW WITH THE GOVERNOR,
ARRANGEMENT OF PLANS - PREPARATION OF OUTFIT - COST OF EXPEDITION - NAME A
DAY FOR DEPARTURE - PUBLIC BREAKFAST AND COMMENCEMENT OF THE UNDERTAKING.
Before entering upon the account of the expedition sent to explore the
interior of Australia, to which the following pages refer, it may perhaps
be as well to advert briefly to the circumstances which led to the
undertaking itself, that the public being fully in possession of the
motives and inducements which led me, at a very great sacrifice of my
private means, to engage in an exploration so hazardous and arduous, and
informed of the degree of confidence reposed in me by those interested in
the undertaking, and the sanguine hopes and high expectations that were
formed as to the result, may be better able to judge how far that
confidence was well placed, and how far my exertions were commensurate
with the magnitude of the responsibility I had undertaken.
I have felt it the more necessary to allude to this subject now, because
I was in some measure at the time instrumental in putting a stop to a
contemplated expedition to the westward, and of thus unintentionally
interfering with the employment of a personal friend of my own, than whom
no one could have been more fitted to command an undertaking of the kind,
from his amiable disposition, his extensive experience, and his general
knowledge and acquirements.
