The Stream Purling Over Its Stony Floor Produces A Most Agreeable Sound, Such As I Have Not Heard For Many A Day.

Here I might say, "Brightly the brook through the green leaflets, giddy with joyousness, dances along."

Soon after we had unpacked and let go our horses, we were accosted by a native on the opposite side of the creek. Our little dog became furious; then two natives appeared. We made an attempt at a long conversation, but signally failed, for neither of us knew many of the words the other was saying. The only bit of information I obtained from them was their name for the river - as they kept continually pointing to it and repeating the word Larapinta. This word, among the Peake and Charlotte natives, means a snake, and from the continual serpentine windings of this peculiar and only Central Australian river, no doubt the name is derived. I shot a hawk for them, and they departed. The weather to-day was fine, with agreeable cool breezes; the sky has become rather overcast; the flies are very numerous and troublesome; and it seems probable we may have a slight fall of rain before long.

A few drops of rain fell during the night, which made me regret that I had not our tarpaulins erected, though no more fell. In the morning there was sultriness in the air though the sky was clear; the thermometer stood at 52 degrees, and at sunrise a smoky haze pervaded the whole sky. Whilst we were packing up the horses this morning, the same two natives whom we saw last night, again made their appearance, bringing with them a third, who was painted, feathered, greased, and red-ochred, in, as they doubtless thought, the most alarming manner. I had just mounted my horse, and rode towards them, thinking to get some more information from the warrior as to the course of the creek, etc., but when they saw the horse approaching they scampered off, and the bedizened warrior projected himself into the friendly branches of the nearest tree with the most astonishing velocity. Perceiving that it was useless to try to approach them, without actually running them to earth, we left them; and crossing the river easily over its stony bed, we continued north-west towards a mountain in the ranges that traversed the horizon in that direction. The river appeared to come from the same spot. A breeze from the north-west caused the dust raised by the pack-horses, which we drove in a mob before us, travelling upon the loose soil where the spinifex had all been lately burnt, to blow directly in our faces. At five miles we struck on a bend of a river, and we saw great volumes of smoke from burning grass and triodia rising in all directions. The natives find it easier to catch game when the ground is bare, or covered only with a short vegetation, than when it is clothed with thick coarse grasses or pungent shrubs.

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