The expedition quitted Bernier Island on the 22nd of March, to make for Swan River. In taking this course, it was hoped, that if any accident occurred Perth could be reached by walking. Crossing the bay, the party sailed to the southward, examining the coast, and after a brief stay on Perron’s Peninsula and Dirk Hartog’s Island, the boats on the 31st, reached Gantheaume Bay. Eleven days were spent in achieving this run: the coasting was very perilous, and the gales that caught the leaky boats as they swept along, were terrific. Both were more than once in imminent danger, but the unsparing energy and determination of the men carried them safely to the shore. At Gantheaume Bay, however, the landing was not effected without casualty. The surf was high and raging, and the wind drove the boats along at a fearful rate. Onwards they plunged, now dancing on a swell, now pitching in a trough, now quite unmanageable, when one was tossed over by a furious wave and dashed in fragments amongst the rocks and breakers. In an instant, its crew and the two sappers were struggling through the foaming surf, but after tumbling amongst oars and water-kegs, and the spars and splinters of the wreck, all clambered to the summit of the cliff, torn, jaded, and exhausted.[336] ----- Footnote 336: ‘Grey’s Travels,’ i. p. 396-412. ----- A crisis had now arrived which it was necessary to meet with firmness. Assembling the expedition, the captain explained matters as they appeared, and of which the travellers were only too cognizant. Auger, who all along had repaired the boats, was asked by the chief, if they could be put in any kind of condition for service. Knowing their unfitness for anything, and the impossibility of making them even temporarily seaworthy, he frankly answered in the negative. Fortified by the professional opinion of a truthful and skilful artificer, Captain Grey took his determination at once and arrangements were made accordingly. On the 2nd April, the party started from Gantheaume Bay, resolved to reach Perth by marching. The provisions had been shared out—20 lbs. of flour and 1 lb. of salt meat per man. The flour was of a brown colour with a fermented taste, like bad beer, and nothing but dire necessity could induce any one to eat it. The distance to be travelled was about 300 miles in a direct line, without taking hills, valleys, and deviations into account. Corporals Coles and Auger, besides their provisions, &c., carried a pocket chronometer and a large sextant, turn about. Coles also bore the Captain’s rifle, and Auger a choice book valued by the chief, and a housewife containing some needles and thread and a few patches. In all the dreadful hardships that beset them, even when extreme feebleness might have excused them the toil of bearing the articles, they abandoned nothing until ordered to do so. “Indeed,” says Captain Grey, “I do not believe that there is a stronger instance of fidelity and perseverance than was evinced by some of