Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia — CompleteSturt, Charles
History
Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia — Complete
Sturt, Charles
New South Wales -- Discovery and exploration; Sturt, Charles, 1795-1869
In the morning we started at an early hour, and immediately entered the
brush, beneath which we had slept; pursuing a westerly course through it.
After a short ride, we found ourselves upon a plain, that was crowded with
flocks of cockatoos. Here we got a supply of water, such as it was--so
mixed with slime as to hang in strings between the fingers; and, after a
hasty breakfast, we proceeded on our journey, mostly through a barren
sandy scrub that was a perfect burrow from the number of wombats in it, to
within a mile of the hill group, where the country appeared like one
continuous meadow to the very base of them. I never saw anything like the
luxuriance of the grass on this tract of country, waving as it did higher
than our horses' middles as we rode through it. We ascended the S.W. face
of the mountain to an elevation of at least 800 feet above the level of
the plain, and had some difficulty in scaling the masses of rock that
opposed themselves to our progress. But on gaining the summit, we were
amply repaid for our trouble. The view extended far and wide, but we were
again disappointed in the main object that had induced us to undertake the
journey. I took the following bearings by compass. Oxley's Table Land bore
N. 40 E. distant forty-five miles; small and distant hill due E.; conical
peak seen from Oxley's Table Land S. 60 E., very distant; long ridge of
high land, S.E., distant thirty-five miles; high land, S. 30 E., distant
thirty miles; long range, S. 25 W.
To the westward, as a medium point, the horizon was unbroken, and the eye
wandered over an apparently endless succession of wood and plain. A
brighter green than usual marked the course of the mountain torrents in
several places, but there was no glittering light among the trees, no
smoke to betray a water hole, or to tell that a single inhabitant was
traversing the extensive region we were overlooking. We were obliged to
return to the plain on which we had breakfasted, and to sleep upon it.
D'URBAN'S GROUP.
D'Urban's Group is of compact sandstone formation. Its extreme length is
from E.S.E. to W.N.W., and cannot be more than from seven to nine miles,
whilst its breadth is from two to four. The central space forms a large
basin, in which there are stunted pines and eucalyptus scrub, amid huge
fragments of rocks. It rises like an island from the midst of the ocean,
and as I looked upon it from the plains below, I could without any great
stretch of the imagination, picture to myself that it really was such.
Bold and precipitous, it only wanted the sea to lave its base; and I
cannot but think that such must at no very remote period have been the
case, and that the immense flat we had been traversing, is of
comparatively recent formation.
We reached the camp on the 28th of the month, by nearly the same route;
and were happy to find that, after the few days' rest they had enjoyed,
there was a considerable improvement in the animals.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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