334 SIR RODERICK I. MURCHISON'S ADDRESS— AUSTRALIA. [May 23, 1859. 



treaclierous, but easily intimidated. Despite of all impediments and 

 much privation, the adventurers pushed on up Thompson River, 

 through a desolate and arid, red-coloured, sandy country, until they 

 reached lat. 23° 47', when the total cessation of water and grass put 

 an end to all efforts to penetrate farther to the north-west. Compelled 

 most unwillingly to abandon the principal object of their travels by 

 continuing to follow the route probably taken by Leichhardt, Gregory 

 and his companions then turned to the south-west, and ascertained 

 the nature of the country between his remote position and Kennedy's 

 farthest explorations, proceeding through more southern latitudes to 

 reach the settled country of South Australia. The vicissitudes and 

 privations experienced in this route to the south-east are succinctly 

 related, and the outlines of ground, whether stony desert, plains 

 with low ridges of red drift- sand, or sandstone table-lands, are well 

 defined. Advancing by Cooper Creek, and that branch of it named 

 by Sturt, Strzelecki Creek, the travellers finally reached Adelaide. 



Respecting the fate of Leichhardt, Mr. A. Gregory thinks 

 it probable that the adventurous traveller, advancing from the 

 Yictoria, was lured on to the north-west by favouring thunder- 

 showers, until, on the cessation of the rains, he was arrested in the 

 parched and waterless tract, and, unable to advance or retreat, he 

 perished in the wilderness.* Gregory also informs us, that west of 

 the meridian of 147° E. long, most of the country is unfit for occu- 

 pation, until the boundary of the colony of South Australia, or 141° 

 E. long., is reached in more southern parallels. 



Our medallist is, indeed, well borne out in saying that the results 

 of his expedition are most important with reference to the physical 

 geography of Australia ; for when combined with the researches of 

 Sturt, they seem to demonstrate that, whether as examined from 

 the north-east or south, a very large portion indeed of the interior 

 is a worthless saline desert, very little above the level of the sea. 



Explorations westward and north-westward from South Australia. — 

 "Whilst the last journey of Augustus Gregory has served to confirm 

 the view established by the researches of Sturt, that a vast interior 

 and sterile low region lies to the north of South Australia, and 

 extends to the higher lands which form the western limits of 

 New Sout^ Wales on the east, and to the elevations south of 

 Cambridge Gulf on the north, the surveys set on foot at Adelaide 



* My friend the Rev. W. C. Clarke has written able notices in the * Sydney Morning 

 Herald,' in which he differs in opinion from Mr. A. Gregory as to the track followed by 

 Leichhardt. 



