flowing by various small channels in a south-westerly direction.
The main channel, however, continues nearly south until it is lost
on an extensive earthy plain covered with marshmallows and
chrysanthemums.

Creek.--In one of the valleys between the sand hills, at a distance
of about ten miles in a south-westerly direction, we found a
shallow waterhole where a creek is formed for a short distance, and
is then lost again on the earthy plain beyond. West by north and
west from here, about twelve miles, there are some splendid sheets
of water, in some places two and three chains broad; the banks well
timbered, but the land in the neighbourhood so loose and rotten
that one can scarcely ride over it. I expect this is the reason why
we saw no blacks about here, for it must be worse for them to walk
over than the stony ground. From Camp 60 the general course of the
creek is north-west, but it frequently disappears on the earthy
plains for several miles, and then forms into waterholes again
finer than before. At our first depot, Camp 63, in latitude 27
degrees 36 minutes 15 seconds south, longitude 141 degrees 30
minutes east, there is a fine hole about a mile long, and on an
average one chain and a half broad. It exceeds five feet in depth
everywhere that I tried it, except within three or four feet of the
bank. Two or three miles above this camp we saw the first melaburus
growing around the waterholes, some of them as large as a moderate
size gum tree.

Earthy Flat.--The feed in the vicinity of Camp 63 is
unexceptionable, both for horses and camels but the herbage on the
creek generally down to this point is of a very inferior quality;
the grasses are very coarse, and bear a very small proportion to