west of the eastern colonies. Settlements have been established on the
shores of the Gulf of Carpentaria. Burke and a small party crossed
Australia from south to north, enduring innumerable hardships, Burke,
with two of his associates, perishing on the return journey. About the
same time Stuart crossed farther to the west, reaching the very centre of
Australia, and telegraphic wires now almost exactly follow his line of
route, affording communication, by way of Port Darwin, between Adelaide
and the great telegraphic systems of the world.

ATTEMPTS TO CROSS THE DESERT.

The telegraph line divides Australia into two portions, nearly equal in
dimensions, but very different in character. To the east are the busy and
rapidly advancing settlements, fertile plains, extensive ranges of grassy
downs, broad rivers, abundant vegetation; to the west a great lone land,
a wilderness interspersed with salt marshes and lakes, barren hills, and
spinifex deserts. It is the Sahara of the south, but a Sahara with few
oases of fertility, beyond which is the thin fringe of scattered
settlements of the colony of Western Australia. To cross this desert, to
discover routes connecting the western territory with South Australia and
the line marked by the telegraph, has been the ambition of later
explorers. Mr. Gregory attempted, from the north, to ascend the Victoria
River, but only reached the upper edge of the great desert. Dr.
Leichardt, who had previously travelled from Moreton Bay, on the eastern
coast, to Port Essington on the northern, attempted to cross from the
eastern to the western shores, and has not since been heard of. Mr. Eyre
made a journey, memorable for the misfortunes which attended it, and the
sufferings he endured, from Adelaide round the head of the great bay, or
Bight of Southern Australia, to Perth, the capital of Western Australia;
and much more recently Colonel Egerton Warburton succeeded in crossing