LATE Al-LAN CUNNINGHAM, ESQ, 241 



more than twenty feet wide, running with a generally western 

 course at the rate of 2h knots per hour. Down this dimin- 

 ished stream they continued to travel with the daily expec- 

 tation of a termination to their journey from the shallow 

 state of the river, and the continued flatness of the country. 

 At length on the 7th of July, a final stop was put to their 

 further progress westward, hy the river once more losing itself 

 in reedy marshes and interminable creeks ; and after bury- 

 ing a bottle containing a paper with a short account of their 

 proceedings up to that date, and their future intended route, 

 they turned their faces again to the eastward, and recom- 

 menced the ascent of the Lachlan. The course they now 

 took was north-easterly, keeping as near the river as the 

 swampy nature of its banks and the numerous lagoons would 

 allow. On the 3d of August, they crossed to the northern 

 bank of the Lachlan by means of a raft, their various at- 

 tempts at throwing a bridge across having failed from the 

 great rapidity of the current carrying off the trees they 

 felled for that purpose. They again pushed forward, and 

 Were once more fated to be entangled in the same miserable 

 scrubby country that they had formerly named the Euryalean 

 Scrub, and were put to much inconvenience and distress for 

 want of water. A few days' journey, however, cleared them 

 from this wretched district, and they came upon a country 

 diversified by hill and vale, and what to them was of such 

 great importance, well watered ; and at length on the 19th 

 of August, after a journey of 150 miles from the northern 

 bank of the Lachlan, they came upon the Macquarie, in the 

 immediate vicinity of what is now known as Wellington 

 Valley. Although their provisions were well nigh exhausted, 

 their apprehensions on the score of famine were dissipated, 

 by finding in the district they were now traversing, large 

 quantities of game, viz., emu, kangaroo, &c., and with the 

 pleasing anticipation of soon arriving at Bathurst, they push- 

 ed on with redoubled vigour to reach that station, which they 

 accomplished on the evening of the 29th of August, after an 

 absence of nineteen weeks, the greater portion of which time 

 Vol. IV._No. 29. 2 H 



