Regions betiveen the Rivers Lachlan and Darling. 129 



up to the distance of teu or fifteen feet witli the greatest ease. 

 The structure of the root of this tree or shrub is tubular^ so 

 that water can easily be drawn up through it to the height of 

 several feet. 



I had supposed that the country lying back from the 

 Murray would be found nearly on a level with the rest of the 

 Murray country, but on entering the malice we soon found 

 that we were gradually ascending. The scrub is large and 

 remarkably open ; limestone, in the form of coarse gravel, 

 generally crops everywhere tlu'ough the surface. There is an 

 undergrowth of saltbush, and numerous prickly shrubs, so 

 that even the mallee is capable of being, hereafter, depastured 

 by small flocks of sheep. 



We had not proceeded far through the scrub when we came 

 to ridges of loose red sand, covered with bunches of spinefex. 

 These ridges, which resemble those observed by Sturt and 

 Gregory, occiu* irregularly at intervals of a mile, or of a few 

 hundred yards. They invariably trend in one direction, 

 coincident with the true east and Avest — not the magnetic. 

 It is worthy of remark, that wherever those ridges of sand 

 occur, it is on the brow of a step to a higher level. This and 

 the extreme purity of the sand, seem to indicate that they 

 owe their origin to water, and not to the influence of the 

 winds. 



A few miles into the scrub, ]Mr. Ross has had a well sunk 

 to the depth of fifty or sixty feet, but the workmen liaAdng 

 come upon a bed of sand, with abundance of salt water, they 

 had to stop. The whole of the material dug out of this Avell 

 consists of an anctuous white clay or marl, containing lime. 

 ]Mr. Ross has had altogether three wells sunk, the furthest 

 out one being about fifty miles back from the ]Murray. In 

 all of them water was obtained, but invariably salt; in the 

 furthest out one, however, not so much so as in those nearer 

 the Murray. 



Proceeding N.N.E., the mallee becomes even more open, 

 and saltbush and bcrcc — a scented wood, like the myall — are 

 plentiful. At the distance of about twenty-five miles from the 

 Murray we came to the edge of the open plains. 



The line of diA-ision between the scrub and the open 

 plains runs nearly north and south ; and it would appear that 

 there has been here some subterranean disturbance, causing 

 a depression, extending irregularly along the line of division, 

 for the open country slopes from the north-east, towards the 

 high ground on which the mallee grows ; hence it is along 



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