Natives Who, From Infancy, Have Been Accustomed To Travel Through Arid Regions, Can Remain Any Length Of Time Out In A Country Where There Are No Indications Of Water.

The circumstance of natives being seen, in travelling through an unknown district, is therefore no proof of the existence of water in their vicinity.

I have myself observed, that no part of the country is so utterly worthless, as not to have attractions sufficient occasionally to tempt the wandering savage into its recesses. In the arid, barren, naked plains of the north, with not a shrub to shelter him from the heat, not a stick to burn for his fire (except what he carried with him), the native is found, and where, as far as I could ascertain, the whole country around appeared equally devoid of either animal or vegetable life. In other cases, the very regions, which, in the eyes of the European, are most barren and worthless, are to the native the most valuable and productive. Such are dense brushes, or sandy tracts of country, covered with shrubs, for here the wallabie, the opossum, the kangaroo rat, the bandicoot, the leipoa, snakes, lizards, iguanas, and many other animals, reptiles, birds, etc., abound; whilst the kangaroo, the emu, and the native dog, are found upon their borders, or in the vicinity of those small, grassy plains, which are occasionally met with amidst the closest brushes.

Chapter XVII.

HORSES BEGIN TO KNOCK UP - COMPELLED TO FOLLOW ROUND THE BEACH - TINOR PONY UNABLE TO PROCEED - GLOOMY PROSPECTS - OVERSEER BEGINS TO DESPOND - TWO MORE HORSES LEFT BEHIND - FRAGMENTS OF WRECKS - WATER ALL CONSUMED - COLLECT DEW - CHANGE IN CHARACTER OF COUNTRY - DIG A WELL - PROCURE WATER - NATIVE AND FAMILY VISIT US - OVERSEER GOES BACK FOR BAGGAGE - DISASTROUS TERMINATION OF HIS JOURNEY - SITUATION AND PROSPECTS OF THE PARTY.

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