Two of the horses having broken from their tether during the night, we
were obliged to put the three saddles on the remaining horse, and proceed
to track the stray horses; after tracking them about two miles, we found
them on their way back to the camp. We then rode along the western foot
of Moresby's Range, and ascended Mount Fairfax; after taking sketches and
bearings, we steered for the encampment, and reached it about 2.0 p.m.

30th October.

Messrs. Burges, Walcott, and Bedart rode out this morning to examine the
grassy hills on the south side of the Chapman River, and on their return
reported the country to be of a generally good grassy character.

NATIVES STEAL FRYING-PAN.

31st October.

Left the encampment at 8.0 a.m. and steering 200 degrees magnetic over
alternately grassy and scrubby hills of granite sandstone, crossed the
Chapman at 9.40. Our course then lay nearly parallel to the river till
noon; the land on the river was indifferent and thinly grassed, but rose
into good grassy hills about a mile from the river. We then entered a
level scrubby plain, extending from the Victoria Range to the sea. At
12.30 p.m. altered the course to 175 degrees magnetic, and at 1.5 to 139
degrees magnetic. At 1.15 the plain became grassy, and the soil good
(with the exception of a few patches of York gum, the only trees were
wattles), and by a rough estimate contained about 8,000 acres of good
grassy land; on the north bank of the Greenough River, which we reached
at 3.15, the channel was about seventy yards wide, but dry and sandy; nor