for some distance, beckoning us away to the north-east. We however
continued our course north-west by north, but at a distance of one
mile and a half found that the creek did not come round as we
expected, and that the fall of the water was in a direction nearly
opposite to our course, or about west to east. We struck off north
half west for a high sand ridge, from which we anticipated seeing
whether it were worth while for us to follow the course of the
creeks we had crossed. We were surprised to find all the
watercourses on the plains trending rather to the south of east,
and at a distance of three miles, after changing our course, and
when we approached the sandhills towards which we had been
steering, we were agreeably pulled up by a magnificent creek coming
from the north-north-west, and running in the direction of the fire
we had seen. We had now no choice but to change our course again,
for we could not have crossed even if we had desired to do so. On
following up the south bank of the creek we found it soon keeping a
more northerly course than it had where we first struck it. This
fact, together with its magnitude and general appearance, lessened
the probability of its being Eyre's Creek, as seemed at first very
likely from their relative positions and directions. The day being
very hot and the camels tired from travelling over the earthy
plains, which by-the-by are not nearly so bad as those at the head
of Cooper's Creek, we camped at one P.M., having traced the creek
up about five miles, not counting the bends. For the whole of this
distance we found not a break or interruption of water, which
appears to be very deep; the banks are from twenty to thirty feet
above the water, and very steep; they are clothed near the water's
edge with mint and other weeds, and on the top of each side there
is a belt of box trees and various shrubs. The lower part of the
creek is bounded towards the north by a high red sand ridge, and on