31G LAND EXCURSION. 



trees, fifteen feet above our heads. It was now 

 quite clear that all hopes of water carriage towards 

 the interior were at an end. The boats were at this 

 time above fifty m les from the entrance, and our 

 provisions only admitting of the remainder of this 

 day being spent in land exploration, a party was 

 immediately selected for this service. 



Following up a short woody valley, on reaching 

 the summit of the level a view burst upon me, the 

 nature of which the reader may learn from the 

 accompanying plate. A vast boundless plain lay 

 before us, here and there dotted over with wood- 

 land isles. Whilst takins^ the bearinos of one of 

 these to guide us in the direction we were to steer, 

 I sent a man up a tree to have a further view ; but 

 nothing beyond an extension of the plain was to be 

 seen. . The river could be traced to the southward 

 by a waving line of green trees ; the latter were 

 larger at this spot than in any other part, and con- 

 sisted of tall palms, and three kinds of gums. No 

 trace of the western branch could be discovered. *i 



Time being, as I have before said, very precious, 

 we moved off in a S. S. E. direction, at the rate of al- 

 most four miles an hour, in spite of the long coarse 

 grass lying on the ground and entangling our legs. 

 The soil* was still a light-coloured mould of great 

 depth, and according to one so well qualified to judge 



* My immediate visit to Port Essiugton afforded me an oppor- 

 tunity of comparing the qualities of the two soils; and the result 

 was that the richest land I saw there, in spite of tlie aid of 

 manure, &c. was very inferior to that on the Plains of Promise. 



