Poor Coles however was in a dreadful state.
The country through which we were travelling is intersected by a long line of lakes which run nearly parallel to the sea for a distance of about forty-five miles.

One of the party had travelled in the same direction with me before, but we had then kept along the edge of the lakes.

He had imagined however that they were only two or three miles distant from the sea, whereas many of them were as much as eight or ten.
The route we were pursuing was about midway between the lakes and the sea, and this man seeing nothing of the lakes could not be convinced that I was right in the position I said we then were; for I assured the men they were not more than twenty-seven or twenty-eight miles to the north of Perth; but I heard him relating his doubts, which tended to discourage the others very much.
A PARTY OF NATIVES.
We however walked on as well as we could until near noon, at which time, from excessive weakness, we had not made more than eight miles, or about a mile and a quarter an hour, when we suddenly came out on the bed of a dried-up swamp, now looking like a desert of white sand studded with reeds.

The forms of natives were seen wandering about this, one mile from us, who were searching for frogs.

There was a very numerous party, and they did not appear at all inclined to approach us.