32 GKEGOKY. [Feb. 11, 1856. 



colony in Australia. Now in whatever (Australian) colony * one may live (and 

 I have been in them all), the hot wind always comes from the interior ; that 

 is, in Western Australia it is an east wind, in New South Wales it is a west 

 wind, and in South Australia it is a north wind. Must not then the cause of 

 its temperature be sought in the interior ? The reason is that when the water 

 is evaporated from the surface of the interior, the powerful sun converts the 

 shallow winter lakes into parched and burning plains, which are to the traveller 

 like hot ovens. To Capt. Sturt they showed a temperature of 130° in the shade 

 of his tent. I have seen the thermometer at 120° in these plains for days 

 togetlier, and not falling ten degrees in the night. The air of the whole country 

 dances and glistens like a burning brickfield. The winds that pass over this 

 heated country, convey a temperature which is well called a hot wind, towards 

 whatever colony they may be blowing. Again, the very wind that is in the 

 summer so hot, is in the winter the coldest, (that is, the wind from the interior 

 is the coldest wind that blows in the winter,) and the reason is, that it then 

 passes over an immense evaporating surface ; the interior country being then 

 covered with shallow water, the air passing over it is cooled much below its 

 natural temperature, and arrives at the colony a cold wind. I believe this 

 reasoning to prove that the vast majority of the interior is as I have assumed 

 it to be, and that it never can be made available for habitation or for 

 commerce, excepting only on or about the dividing ridge or slight elevation 

 (for it can be no mountain) which gives origin to the northern rivers. 



4. Progress of the North Australian Expedition. By A. C. 

 Gregory, Commander. 



Communicated by the Colonial Office. 



Victoria River, N.W. Australia, 24th September, 1855. 

 Gn the 12th of August the Expedition left Moreton Island, and on the 13th 

 entered the inner passage to Torres Straits. After a somewhat tedious passage 

 we reached Albany Island on the 26th, sighted Port Essington on the 1st 

 September, and cleared Clarence Strait at noon the following day ; but owing 

 to the great indraught of the deep indentations of the coast, the ' Monarch ' so 

 greatly deviated from the direct course, that at 10 p.m. she grounded on the 

 Northern reef in the entrance of Port Patterson, and with some difficulty the 

 * Tom Tough * was extricated from the reefs as she was following the bark. 



Unfortunately this occurred at the time of high spring- tide, and it was not 

 till the 10th that endeavours to get the vessel afloat were successful. 



The reef being dry at low water, we were enabled to examine the vessel ; 

 but she did not appear to have suffered any material injury except the loss of 

 about 30 feet of the false keel, nor did she make even so much w^ater, after 

 being got off the reef, as when at Moreton Bay. 



On the same day that the ' Monarch ' was got afloat, we sailed for the 

 Victoria Kiver, but owing to strong tides an 1 calm weather the vessels sepa- 

 rated on the night of the 12th, and I arrived at Point Pearce in the schooner 

 on the 14th. Not finding the bark in Treachery Bay, I proceeded to Blunder 

 Bay, where we arrived the following evening. Finding both water and grass 

 scarce at this point, and the shore ill suited for landing the stock, I returned 

 to Treachery Bay on the 18th, and found the bark had been delayed for three 

 days off Cape Hay by a calm, which I had escaped in the schooner by keeping 

 within the influence of the land-winds. 



* In North-Eastern Australia, which is still unsettled, Lcichhardt remarked the 

 absence of the hot winds from the interior. — Ed. 



