Our Host Here Was A Fine, Hospitable Old Scotchman, Who Has A Most Valuable And Excellent Property.

From Glentromie we went to the Hon. O'Grady Lefroy's station, Walebing, where his son, Mr. Henry Lefroy, welcomed us again as he had done so cordially on our first visit.

At every place where we halted, country people continually came riding and driving in to see the camels, and an amusing incident occurred here. Young Lefroy had a tidy old housekeeper, who was quite the grande dame amongst the young wives and daughters of the surrounding farmers. I remained on Sunday, and, as usual, a crowd of people came. The camp was situated 200 yards from the buildings, and covered a good space of ground, the camels always being curled round into a circle whenever we camped; the huge bags and leather-covered boxes and pack-saddles filling up most of the space. On this Sunday afternoon a number of women, and girls, were escorted over by the housekeeper. Alec and I had come to the camp just before them, and we watched as they came up very slowly and cautiously to the camp. I was on the point of going over to them, and saying that I was sorry the camels were away feeding, but something Alec Ross said, restrained me, and we waited - the old housekeeper doing the show. To let the others see how clever she was, she came right up to the loads, the others following, and said, "Ah, the poor things!" One of the new arrivals said, "Oh, the poor things, how still and quiet they are," the girls stretching their necks, and nearly staring their eyes out. Alec and I were choking with laughter, and I went up and said, "My dear creature, these are not the camels, these are the loads; the camels are away in the bush, feeding." The old lady seemed greatly annoyed, while the others, in chorus, said, "Oh, oh! what, ain't those the camels there?" etc. By that time the old lady had vanished.

Up to this point we had returned upon the road we had formerly travelled to Perth; now we left our old line, and continued up the telegraph line, and main overland road, from Perth to Champion Bay. Here we shortly entered what in this Colony is called the Victoria Plains district. I found the whole region covered with thick timber, if not actual scrubs; here and there was a slight opening covered with a thorny vegetation three or four feet high. It struck me as being such a queer name, but I subsequently found that in Western Australia a plain means level country, no matter how densely covered with scrubs; undulating scrubs are thickets, and so on. Several times I was mystified by people telling me they knew there were plains to the east, which I had found to be all scrubs, with timber twenty to thirty feet high densely packed on it. The next place we visited, was Mr. James Clinche's establishment at Berkshire Valley, and our reception there was most enthusiastic.

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