Australia Twice Traversed - The Romance Of Exploration, Through Central South Australia, And Western Australia, From 1872 To 1876 By Ernest Giles
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The rocks above, below, and around,
were fringed and decked with various vegetations; shrubs and small
trees ornamented nearly the whole of the surrounding rocks, amongst
which the native fig-tree, Ficus platypoda, was conspicuous.
It must
have been a very pretty place. I could hear the water rushing and
splashing, but could not see anything. It appeared also that the water
ran out of the basin below into the creek channel, which goes on its
course apparently through or into a glen. I describe this peculiar
freak of nature from what Alec told me; I hope my description will not
mislead others. Soon after we found that this was the case, as we now
entered an exceedingly rough and rocky glen full of water - at least so
it appeared to Alec, who could see nothing but water as far down as he
could look. At first the water was between three and four feet deep;
the farther we went the deeper the water became. Could any one have
seen us we must have presented a very novel sight, as the camels got
nearly up to their humps in water, and would occasionally refuse to go
on; they would hang back, break their nose-ropes, and then lie quietly
down until they were nearly drowned. We had to beat and pull them up
the best way we could. It was rather disagreeable for a blind man to
slip off a camel up to his neck in cold water, and, lifting up his
eyelids with both hands, try to see what was going on.
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