Frank went to reside in Queensland in 1862, and was nominated to the Legislative Council of that colony in 1874. Before going to Queensland he had acted for some time as Surveyor-General of Western Australia. He was married at Ipswich, Queensland, to the daughter of Alexander Hume. He held office for some time in the McIlwraith Ministry, as Postmaster-General. He was a gold medallist of the Royal Geographical Society, and one of the best of the Australian explorers, as bushman, navigator, surveyor, and scientist. He died at Toowoomba, in 1888, on the 24th of October. CHAPTER 19. FROM WEST TO EAST. 19.1. AUSTIN. By 1854 the gold fever was running high in Australia, and each colony was eager to discover new diggings within its borders. Robert Austin, Assistant Surveyor-General of Western Australia, was instructed to take charge of an inland exploring party to search for pastoral country, and to examine the interior for indications of gold. He started from the head of the Swan River on a north-easterly course, and on the 16th of July reached a lake, rumours of whose existence had been spread by the blacks, who had called it Cowcowing. The colonists had hoped that it would prove to be a lake of fresh water in the Gascoyne valley, but Cowcowing in reality was a salt marsh, no great distance from the starting-point of Austin's expedition. The lake was dry and its bed covered with salt incrustations, showing that its waters are undoubtedly saline. Thence Austin made directly north, and passing through repellant country, such as always fell to the lot of the early western explorers in their initial efforts, he directed his course to a distant range of table-topped hills. Here he found both grass and water, and named the highest elevation Mount Kenneth, after Kenneth Brown, a member of his party. Thence he kept a north-east course, traversing stony plains intersected by the dry beds of sandy watercourses. Here the party met with dire misfortune. The horses ate from a patch of poisonous box plant, and nearly all of them were disabled. A few escaped, but the greater number never recovered from the effects of the poison, and fourteen died. Pushing on in the hope of finding a safe place in which to recruit, Austin found himself so crippled in his means of transit that he had to abandon all but his most necessary stores.