CHAPTER VIII.
LEAVE THE DEPOT FOR THE NORTH-WEST--SCARCITY OF WATER--FOSSIL LIMESTONE--ARRIVE AT THE FIRST CREEK--EXTENSIVE PLAINS--SUCCESSION OF CREEKS--FLOODED CHARACTER OF THE COUNTRY--POND WITH FISH--STERILE COUNTRY--GRASSY PLAINS--INTREPID NATIVE--COUNTRY APPARENTLY IMPROVES--DISAPPOINTMENTS--WATER FOUND--APPEARANCE OF THE STONY DESERT--NIGHT THEREON--THE EARTHY PLAIN--HILLS RAISED BY REFRACTION--RECOMMENCEMENT OF THE SAND RIDGES--THEIR UNDEVIATING REGULARITY--CONJECTURES AS TO THE DESERT--RELATIVE POSITION OF LAKE TORRENS--CONCLUDING REMARKS.
On the morning of the 14th Mr.Browne and I mounted our horses, and left the camp at 9 a.m., followed by the men I had selected, and crossing the grassy plain in a N.W.direction, soon found ourselves amidst sand hills and scrub.
As I have stated I had determined to preserve a course of 45 degrees to the west of north, or in other words a north-west course, but the reader will readily believe that in such a country I had no distant object on which to rely.

We were therefore obliged to take fresh bearings with great precision from almost every sand-hill, for on the correctness of these bearings, together with our latitude, we had to depend for our true position.

We were indeed like a ship at sea, without the advantage of a steady compass.
Throughout the whole day of our departure from the camp we traversed a better country than that between it and Lake Torrens, insomuch that there was more grass.

Sand ridges and flats succeeded each other, but the former were not so broken and precipitous or the latter so barren, as on our line to the westward, and about four miles from the camp we passed a pool of water to our right.

At five miles we observed a new melaleuca, similar to the one I had remarked when to the north with Joseph, growing on the skirts of the flats, but the shrubs for the most part consisted of hakea and mimosae with geum and many other minor plants.