CH. v.] MEET THE PUPPY TRIBE. 233 



Whiting", Muirhead, and "the Doctor;" and although I 

 insisted on several going together, on such an errand, I had 

 some trouble to prevent these from setting out alone. The 

 river made a sharp turn northward, and at the bend the 

 water was deeper and broader, than we had seen it elsewhere. 

 The taste was perfectly sweet. 



June 12. — We travelled for several miles, over stony 

 ground, which gradually rose to a hill on our right, and 

 then declined rapidly to the river. Descending, at length, 

 to the level ground, we passed through much scrub, which 

 terminated on a plain, bounded on the side, opposite to us, 

 by the large gum-trees or eucalypti, the never failing indi- 

 cators of the river. The stream there ran in a rather con- 

 tracted channel, and over a sandy bed. Its course was to 

 the southward, in which direction extensive plains appeared 

 to stretch along its bank. As I approached the river, a 

 tribe of natives, who were seated very near me at their fires, 

 under a large tree, called out. We communicated in the 

 usual manner, but I could learn nothing from them, about 

 the general course of the Darling lower down. I gave them 

 a clasp-knife, and two young pups of a good breed for 

 killing kangaroos. They expressed astonishment at every 

 thing (no common trait in the aborigines), and I Avas 

 obliged to sit cross-legged before a very old chief nearly 

 blind, while he examined my dress, shirt, pockets, &c. This 

 tribe, like the others, was not at all numerous. 



We proceeded until we arrived under the north-western 

 extremity of Dunlop's range, when we encamped on the 

 margin of a small lagoon, evidently the remains of some 

 flood, which had been produced by the overflowing of the 

 river, only half a mile distant to the north-west. The lagoon 

 was more convenient to us, for watering our cattle, than the 

 river, the left bank of which, adjacent to our camp, was 

 broken to a much greater distance back than I had observed 

 it to be any where higher up. 



June 13. — The wheels of the two carts requiring some 



