The Natives, However, Appeared To Come To This Occasionally For Their Supply; Similar Holes Enabling Them Frequently To Remain Out In The Low Countries Long After The Rain Has Fallen.

After seeing the party move on, with the native boy to act as guide through the scrub, I rode in advance to search for water at the hill marked by Flinders as Bluff Mount, and named by Colonel Gawler, Mount Hill.

This isolated elevation rises abruptly from the field of scrub, in the midst of which it is situated and is of granite formation; nearly at its summit is an open grassy plain, which was visible long before we reached it, and which leads directly over the lowest or centre part of the range; water was found in the holes of rock in the granite, and the grass around was very tolerable. Having ascertained these particulars, I hurried back to the drays to conduct them to a place of encampment. The road was very long and over a heavy sandy country, for the most part densely covered with scrub, and it was late, therefore, when we reached the hill. The horses, however, had good feed and fair allowance of water, but of the latter they drank every drop we could find. During our route to-day, I noticed some little distance to the north-west of our track, a high scrubby range, having clear grassy-looking openings at intervals. In this direction, it is probable that a better line of road might be found than the one we had chosen.

September 30. - After breakfast, I ascended to the summit of Mount Hill, and took a set of angles; whilst the dray wound up the gap between it and another low summit, with which it is connected. Upon descending the hill on the opposite side, I was rejoiced to find two very large pools of water in some granite rocks, one of them appearing to be of a permanent character. Here I halted for an hour and a half, to give the horses a little more water, and fill our casks again before we faced the scrubby waste that was still seen ahead of us. I had been last night within fifty yards of the pools that we now found, but had not discovered them, as the evening was closing in at the time, and I was in great haste to return to my party before dark. Leaving Mount Hill at the course of S. 27 degrees W. we passed through a very dense scrub, the strongest, I think, we had yet experienced; the drays were tearing down the brush with loud crashes, at every step which the horses took, and I could only compare their progress to the effect produced by the efforts of a clearing party, the brush rapidly disappearing before the wheels, and leaving almost as open a road as if it had been cut away by axes; the unfortunate animals, however, had to bear the onus of all, and most severely were they harassed before our short stage was over.

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