Later in the evening some natives were seen driving the bullocks about on the opposite side, but as they desisted when called to, and afterwards cooeyed to the others before they joined them, it was supposed that these had just arrived from a distance. (*Footnote. Gristes peelii.) RETURN OF MR. LARMER, WHO HAD FOUND WATER AND INHABITANTS. Mr. Larmer returned at dusk having seen two more fine ponds of water in the direction of the river bed which we had lately left. He reported however that the watercourse ran eastward, or contrary to that of the Darling, a direction also opposed to the fall of the hills, where it no doubt originated. The party met a tribe of blacks in huts at the largest and most eastern of these ponds. They were perfectly inoffensive, only looking from their huts and asking, as it seemed, which way the party was going. Mr. Larmer reported that he saw from the range which he ascended a higher one about 40 miles to the southward, and smoke in the intermediate valley, the country being covered with a thick scrub. July 23. We proceeded at first 5 1/2 miles along our former route, then eight miles in a north-east direction, by which course we avoided the former camp of the Spitting tribe, and a portion of our route which led over a very soft, cracked plain: we also shortened the distance so much as to gain one day upon three of our former stages. In making this new cut we had the good fortune to meet with firm open ground, so that we encamped by three P.M. within sight of the river and our former route, and five miles beyond the camp of June 27 where the Spitting tribe had probably remained, expecting us. July 24.