Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Volume 1: With Descriptions of the Recently Explored Region of Australia Felix, and of the Present Colony of New South WalesMitchell, T. L. (Thomas Livingstone)
History
Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Volume 1: With Descriptions of the Recently Explored Region of Australia Felix, and of the Present Colony of New South Wales
Mitchell, T. L. (Thomas Livingstone)
Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Mitchell, T. L. (Thomas Livingstone), 1792-1855
when circumstances may have forced him to proceed in that direction,
rather than that he was looking for what he found under the guidance of
any analogy, or series of observations.
In the afternoon I rode back to the hill of Boorr (seven miles) with the
theodolite, and I obtained some useful angles to various points of
Harvey's range, and on such few eminences as could be distinguished in
other directions.
EXCURSION WITH MR. CUNNINGHAM.
April 16.
Mr. Larmer went forward with the carts in a north-west direction while I
proceeded westward, accompanied by Mr. Cunningham, towards a hill which I
had intersected from Mounts Juson and Laidley, and which I expected to
find at about nine miles west by compass from our camp.
EFFECTS OF A HURRICANE IN THE FOREST.
We continued along an undulating ridge for about five miles, crossing
also a flat on which all the trees, for a considerable extent, had been
laid prostrate by some violent hurricane, making a very uncommon opening
in the forest through which we were accustomed to travel. The trunks lay
about due east, and all nearly parallel; thus recording a storm from the
west before which our tents must have gone like chaff before the wind,
and where shelter from the trees, not under them, might have been sought
for in vain.
At 7 1/2 miles we crossed a chain of small ponds falling to the north
(probably Coysgaime's ponds of Oxley) and about one mile further we
ascended the northern shoulder of the hill I was in search of. From the
summit I obtained angles on one or two hills to the south, which lay a
few miles off, but I could not recognise them as having been previously
intersected.
We descended and proceeded northward through the dense woods, in the
midst of which, after estimating distances and time, I at length pulled
my rein, and observed to Mr. Cunningham that I hoped to fall in with Mr.
Larmer, or the track of the carts thereabouts.
ENCAMP WITHOUT WATER.
Just then I heard the crack of a whip, and we soon met Mr. Larmer at the
head of the party. I continued the route in the same direction until
after sunset, when we were obliged to encamp without reaching water.
Bulger however, with the assistance of the natives, found some, after the
rising of the moon, but not until he had been nearly three miles to the
northward in search of it. The cattle could not be watered there that
night as they had already travelled upwards of 15 miles.
I was aware that I might have made the Bogan by proceeding more towards
the north; but I preferred the direct line of route, even at the risk of
encountering a scarcity of water. In the more northerly course we should
have entered a great bight of that river, whereas I was making for its
most southern bend, which was not only in the most direct line towards
Oxley's Tableland, but was also nearer the hills along which I was
desirous of working my survey.
April 17.
ROCKS OF BENY.
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