- We found that we could not maintain our direct course, as
the low ground was so boggy, that the horses were altogether unable to
move on it.
Keeping therefore the banks of the little stream where the
ground was firmer, we reached the chain of hills bounding the valley to
the southward: we wound along the base of the hills on a variety of
courses, not being able to quit them twenty yards without being bogged.
Finding that the hills trended too much to the south-west, we kept down
the bed of a small stream for two or three miles, and halted on a fine
apple tree flat of rich land, watered by a very fine small stream, which
was joined by the one we came down. The main strewn ran to the
northward. The apple tree flats are uniformly of firm hard ground, while
the soil on which grow the iron-bark, pine, and box, is as invariably a
loose sand, rendered by the rain a perfect quicksand. These bogs are the
more provoking, as without such impediments the country is clear and
open, and as favourable for travelling over as could be wished: we have
had any thing but a dry season, and it is to the heavy rain which might
naturally be expected to fall near high mountains, that our present
difficulties must be ascribed. We travelled between nine and ten miles,
but our course made good was nearly south-east only five miles.
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