high flooding, the drift timber being lodged among the bushes several
feet above the ordinary channel. The grass I was sorry to find was rather
old and dry, but still there was a very fair supply of it, a point of
great importance to us at a time when it was necessary to detain the
whole party for two or three weeks in depot, to enable me to examine the
country to the north; my former experience having convinced me that it
would be dangerous to attempt to push on, before ascertaining where grass
and water could be procured.

We had now travelled upwards of eighty miles under Flinders range, from
Crystal brook to Mount Arden, and hitherto the character of that range
had varied but little. High, rocky, and barren, it rises abruptly from
the plains, and so generally even is the country at its base, that we had
no difficulty in keeping our drays within a mile or two of it. This was
convenient, because we had not far to leave our line of route, when
compelled to send up among the ravines for water. The slopes of Flinders
range are steep and precipitous to the westward, and composed principally
of an argillaceous stone or grey quartz, very hard and ringing like metal
when struck with a hammer.

There was no vegetation upon these hills, excepting prickly grass, and
many were coated over so completely with loose stones that from the
steepness of the declivity it was unsafe, if not impossible to ascend
them. At one or two points in our routs I climbed up to the top of high
summits, but was not rewarded for my toil, the prospect being generally
cheerless and barren in the extreme, nor did the account given by Mr.
Brown of his ascent of Mount Brown in March 1802, tempt me to delay a day
to enable me to view the uninteresting prospect he had seen from the
summit of that hill--by far the highest peak in this part of Flinders
range.