of tea per week; it is true we occasionally shot a pigeon or a duck, but the wildness of the birds of all kinds was perfectly unaccountable.

The horses living chiefly on pulpy vegetation had little stamina, and were incapable of enduring much privation or hardship.

No rain had fallen since July, nor was there any present indication of a change.

Much as I desired it, I yet dreaded having to traverse such a country as that into which I was now about to plunge, in a wet state.

With a soil of stiff tenacious clay, already soft from the moisture produced by the mixture of salt in it, I foresaw that in the event of heavy rain, I should be involved in almost inextricable difficulties, but there was no alternative.
On the morning of the 7th I sent Mr.Browne to the westward, to ascertain the nature of the country, and if by any chance he could again find the creek, and in case I had inadvertently mistaken the real creek for a tributary, I myself pushed on to the north, in the hope of intersecting it.