This happy release was followed by a period of successful travelling--not, indeed, void of difficulty, but yet without much of stirring incident. Another depôt was formed, which is well known under the name of the Park. Having enjoyed a short breathing time here, the expedition again proceeded eastward, and touched on the northern extremity of Lake Torrens. A survey of this part having been made, in accordance with special instructions, they returned to the Park Depôt, which was reached just twelve months after Sturt had left Adelaide. As time was thus rapidly passing away, he now resolved to put forth all his strength in a bold effort to reach the summit of his ambition and place his foot on the centre of Australia. Wishing to have as little encumbrance as possible, he divided his party, and, having picked three of the best men, started for the goal of his weary journeys, leaving the remainder in the depôt. Day after day this forlorn hope toiled on. Plain succeeded plain over a dreary expanse of interminable country, redeemed only by a series of parallel watercourses, which afforded a sufficient supply of that indispensable element. One important creek was crossed, but had to be abandoned, as it headed in a wrong direction. Happily, a sufficient compensation was found in the discovery of another creek, which they called the Eyre, after the adventurous explorer; and this godsend in the wilderness they were able to follow for a long distance. It was after they were compelled to leave it that they entered upon the stern realities of travel in the untrodden interior. The country now assumed an aspect so sterile and forbidding as to place it out of comparison with anything which Sturt, the discoverer of deserts, had previously witnessed. For a space of 20 miles nothing was found but a series of sand-ridges succeeding one another with the monotonous regularity of the waves of the sea. The fatigue which had to be endured in crossing this inhospitable tract was indescribable. It greatly weakened the strength of the party, and it was only the hope of soon meeting a change of country which lured them on. Nor was this expectation doomed to disappointment, for a change they met with at a moment's notice. All of a sudden the jaded explorers found a stony desert springing up beneath their feet and stretching away as far as the eye could reach, while it included within its ghastly embrace more than half the horizon. The suddenness of the appearance of this spectre of desolation struck them mute with surprise and horror. One of Sturt's attendants was the first to break the silence, which he did by raising his hands and exclaiming--"Good heavens! did ever man see such country?" Probably he never did. It is worse even than the African Sahara. It is beyond the power of words to describe it as it stands in its lone and dread reality. Sturt's Stony Desert is one unbroken expanse of desolation, a wilderness of red ferruginous sandstone, undergoing