32 EXPLORATION I.N WESTERN AIISTBAI.IA 



covering of any kind ; they had ji piece of a horseshoe rasp 

 and some iron they had made into tomahawks, and I fancy they 

 had half a horseshoe made into the same weapon. 



Next day I went to the blacks' camp and lefi some knives 

 there, but the people had not returned. Then, with a boy, I 

 followed the Artesian Range, and finding a creek coming out of 

 it, ran it up and pitched on a spot for a camp. I sent the boy 

 tack to bring the camp on, and I went on up the creek. 

 Getting into a spur of the Edkin Range, I saw a place where I 

 thought I could get through on to the river. I determined that 

 on the following day I would leave the camp where it was, take 

 one boy and try to get over. Finding next day that I could not 

 take horses up the Edkin Range, I walked four miles to the top 

 before coming to the gorge. The range I found to be 1000 feet 

 above Derby, and it was 400 feet to the bottom of the gorge. 

 The river appeared to run through a continuous gorge and to 

 turn afterwards towards the north. A high table-land mountain 

 loomed up some ten miles away, which appeared to run north 

 and south. There was evidently no possible way of getting to 

 the sea in this direction at least, so I had to get back and try to 

 the southward. 



Nature has been a wonderful engineer here. She has made 

 the ranges terribly rough, and forgot to leave any room for the 

 rivers to pass, so she set to w-ork to cut a passage for thera 

 through the ranges. 



Having struck my old tracks on a south-west course, I 

 followed them for eight miles, then changed the course to south- 

 south-west for two miles and camped, having crossed two 

 funning creeks. This country I have already described. I now 

 went ahead and got on to a divide, and then saw that the 

 country beyond was terribly rough. One big mountain I saw, I 

 named Mt. Philp, after the Hon. R. Philp, Premier of Queens- 

 land, who has proved a true friend to me at all times. It is a 

 very remarkable and prominent object. Another big mountain 

 which I have had in sight for several day^, I called Mt. Smith 

 in honour of the Governor of West Australia. 



The horses were now" in a dreadful state for want of shoes ; 

 however, I had to go on at all hazards. I ran the creek up to the 

 southward, leaving the big table-topped range close on my left. 

 For ten days this range has been on my left hand with no 

 apparent break in it. This is the Synott Range I mentioned 

 previously. To the right were very high stony basalt cliffs. I 

 now struck the head of a creek going south and ran it down for 



