Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central Australia And Overland From Adelaide To King George's Sound In The Years 1840-1: Sent By The Colonists Of South Australia By Eyre, Edward John
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- Early this morning we moved on, leading slowly our jaded
animals through the scrub.
The night had been one of painful suspense and
gloomy forebodings; and the day set in dark and cloudy, as if to
tantalise us with the hope of rain which was not destined to fall. In a
few miles we reached the edge of the cliffs, from which we had a good
view of the sandy valley we had been travelling round, but which the
thick scrub had prevented our scrutinising sooner. I now noticed some
hillocks of bare sand in the midst of it. These I had not seen before, as
the only previous point from which they could have been visible had been
passed by us in the dark. It now struck me, that the water spoken of by
the natives at Yeerkumban-kauwe might be situated among these sand-hills,
and that we were going away from instead of approaching it. The bare idea
of such a possibility was almost maddening, and as the dreadful thought
flashed across my mind I stood for a moment undecided and irresolute as
to what I ought to do. We were now many miles past these hills, and if we
went back to examine them for water, and did not find it, we could never
hope that our horses would be able to return again to search elsewhere;
whilst if there was water there, and we did not return, every step we
took would but carry us further from it, and lead to our certain
destruction.
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