Scientific Intelligence — Meteorology and Hydrology. 395 



that the washings for several successive years were farmed at four 

 times their ordinary rent. It is generally believed that the accumu- 

 lation of the waters of the Indus was occasioned by a landslip which 

 blocked up the valley ; but this and other interesting questions we 

 must leave for solution to Mr Vans Agnew, whose late mission to 

 Gilget promises so much to the lovers of science. — (Journal of the 

 Asiatic Society of Bengal, New Series, No. 188, p. 230.) 



4. Flood in the Macquarie, in Australia. — The talented and ener- 

 getic Sir Thomas Mitchell, Surveyor-General of New South Wales, 

 in his lately-published Travels in Tropical Australia, gives the fol- 

 lowing graphic account of a flood in the Macquarie : — 



" 13th February. — I was again laid up with the maladie dwpays 

 — sore eyes. Mr Stephenson took a ride for me to the summit of 

 Mount Foster, and to various cattle-stations about its base, with 

 some questions, to which I required answers, about the river and sta- 

 tions on it lower down. But no one could tell what the western side 

 of the marshes was like, as no person had passed that way ; the 

 country being more open on the eastern side, where only the sta- 

 tions were situated ; Mr Kinghorne's, at Graway, about five miles 

 from our camp, being the lowest down on the west bank. Mr 

 Stephenson returned early, having met two of the mounted poUce. 

 To my most important question — What water was to be found lower 

 down in the river \ the reply was very satisfactory, namely, ' Plenty, 

 and ay' lod coming down from the Turon mountains.' The two po- 

 licemen said they had travelled twenty miles with it on the day pre- 

 vious, and that it would still take some time to arrive near our camp. 

 About noon the drays arrived in good order, having been encamped 

 where there was no water, about six miles short of our camp ; the 

 whole distance travelled, from Cannonba to the Macquarie, having 

 been about nineteen miles. In the afternoon two of the men, taking 

 a walk up the river, I'cported, on their return, that the flood poured 

 in upon them, wlien in the river-bed, so suddenly, that they narrowly 

 escaped it. Still the bed of the Macquarie before our camp conti- 

 nued so dry and silent, that I could scarcely believe the flood coming 

 to be real, and so near to us, who had been put to so many shifts 

 for want of water. Towards evening, I stationed a man with a gun 

 a little way up the river, with orders to fire on the flood's appear- 

 ance, that I might have time to run to the part of the channel near- 

 est to our camp, and witness what I had so much wished to see, as 

 well fi'om curiosity as urgent need. The shades of evening came, 

 however, but no flood ; and the man on the look-out returned to the 

 camp. Some hours later, and alter the moon had risen, a murmur- 

 ing sound like that of a distant waterfall, mingled with occa- 

 sional cracks as of breaking timber, drew our attention, and I 

 hastened to the river-bank. By very slow degrees the sound grew 

 louder, and at length so audible, as to draw various persons be- 

 sides from the camp to tlie river-side. Still no flood ap- 



