LEICHHARDTS OVERLAND EXPEDITION 191 



CAMP, in lat. 16 3' n" S., was on a swamp or sedgy lagoon near 

 bench mark L. 



2yd June. Eight or 9 miles NW. down the Mitchell, 

 passing a great number of dry SWAMPS. The CAMP was in lat. 

 1 6 o' 26", about the bench mark R 100. The river is thus described: 

 " Its banks were covered with a rather open vine brush. Palm 

 trees became numerous and grew 40 or 50 feet high, with a thick 

 trunk swelling in the middle and tapering upwards and downwards. 

 Sarcocepbalus, the clustered fig tree, and the drooping tea tree 

 were also present as usual. The bed of the river, an immense sheet 

 of sand, was full a mile and a half broad, but the stream itself did not 

 exceed 30 yards in width." In the course of this day's journey, 

 the infall of the PALMER RIVER was passed, but was not observed. 



2^th June. Nine miles W. by N., to lat. 15 59' 30" S., the 

 CAMP being on PLAIN CREEK. This creek leaks out of the left 

 bank of the Mitchell and falls into Dunbar Creek, which itself 

 leaks out of the Mitchell. Leichhardt, referring to it, remarks 

 that " a chain of water-holes, fringed with mangrove myrtle, 

 changed into a creek which had no connection with the river, but 

 was probably one of the heads of the Nassau." 



This erroneous conjecture has been followed by all subsequent 

 cartographers, and the creek named DUNBAR CREEK where it issues 

 from the river, is designated the Nassau River further to the west. 



It SHOULD BE NAMED THE DUNBAR THROUGHOUT. 



The inlet which the Dutch navigators named the NASSAU 

 REVIER is the river which hugs the parallel of 16 30' S. lat. 

 westward from the meridian of 142 35' E. long., and which 

 is erroneously named the Staaten on modern maps. The true 

 STATEN REVIER of the Dutch is one of the mouths of the Gilbert 

 River, probably Accident Inlet. 



2$th June. Travelled 10 miles NW., but did not follow the 

 river, which made large windings to the north. The track lay 

 " over a well-grassed forest land and several CREEKS, WHICH, 



ALTHOUGH RISING NEAR THE RIVER, APPEARED TO HAVE NO COM- 

 MUNICATION WITH IT." The plains, says Leichhardt, " rose 

 slightly towards the river, forming a remarkable watershed, perhaps 

 between the Nassau (i.e., DUNBAR CREEK) and the MITCHELL." 



Leichhardt was, in fact, puzzled by a phenomenon which is 

 well known to travellers in lands where large rivers deploy upon 

 flat country. The beds of such rivers tend to silt up, and the 

 deposits left by periodical floods raise the banks until they become 

 the highest land of the neighbourhood. The best known instance 

 is that of " China's Sorrow," the HOANG Ho, whose channel has 

 to be laboriously cleared out from time to time as a precaution 

 against the inundation of the " netherlands." 



The CAMP of 2$th June was in 15 21' 26 / ' S. lat., on an 

 anabranch now known as LEICHHARDT CREEK. 



