68 COURSE OF THE VICTORIA. 



half a mile. As none of our party had been recently 

 accustomed to much pedestrian exercise, and had 

 been travelling for nearly five hours over a broken 

 country, and in a temperature varying from 87° to 

 100° in the shade, I thought it time to halt and 

 dine. While dinner was being prepared, Mr. 

 Bynoe and myself shot three brace of rare ducks, 

 of a small light grey kind, in the pools near. I 

 afterwards accompanied Mr. Forsyth to get some 

 bearings from an elevation on the north side of the 

 river. Towards the south-east we perceived a very 

 decided break in the hills, through which I hoped 

 to trace the course of the Victoria, that being the 

 direction of the centre of this vast continent : in 

 this however we were disappointed, for the river 

 turned short round to the north-east. The banks 

 were so high, and so thickly covered with tall reeds, 

 that it was only by the very green appearance of 

 the trees about its banks that its course could be 

 made out. The temperature at one, p. m. in the sun 

 was 127". Knowing how impossible it was to avoid 

 being tracked by the natives, should they wish it, 

 even upon the hardest ground, and that in the event 

 of their doing so any buried stores would be forth- 

 with discovered, and yet anxious to disencumber the 

 party of any superfluous load, I directed one of the 

 men to take the 81 b. canister of preserved meat and 

 throw it into a thick cluster of reeds and palms, 

 about thirty vards distant ; and after takincr a set of 

 sights for longitude, recommenced our journev to 



