HORN EXPEDITION — NARRATIVE. 17 



flakes. It i.s evidently very local in its distribution, and we lut^t witii it nowhere 

 else except in this district. 



Tra.vellint; o\er tliis connti-y during the daytime, with its dried up creeks and 

 stony giliber plains, there is little which looks picturesque ; hut at sumlown the 

 scene becomes quite changed, and it is hard to believe that the picturesque 

 appearance is due simply to atmospheric conditions. 



Jii the desolate gil)l)er countiy near the Macumba the effect was really 

 beautiful. Away to the east the land rose to flat-topped, terraced ranges. Tn the 

 foreground were white-blue salt-bushes, with pale, light blue patches of low 

 herbage and still lighter tufts of grass amongst them, standing out in strong 

 contrast to the purple-brown gibbei-s. The countiy was ci'ossed by dark lines of 

 nuilga, marking the creek beds and sti'eaking away up to the hills, wiiich stood 

 out sharply against a cold steel-blue sky, melting above into sa,lmon-piid< and this 

 into deep ultra marine. In the west was a rich after-glow, against whiih the 

 stony plains and hills looked dark purple, with the mulga branches standing out 

 sharp and thin against the sky. 



The colours of the Central Australian Inndscape at sunrise and sunset are 

 just those which at morning and evening light up the barren i-anges of Arabia — 

 everything is soft and brilliant, but \'ei-y thin. 



One of the most stiiking features of the central area, and especially amongst 

 the loamy plains and sandhills, is the number of clay-pans. These are shallow 

 depressions with no outlet, and varying in length fi'om a few yards to half-a-nule, 

 where tlie surface is covered with a thin layer of clayey material, which seems to 

 pi-e\ent the water from sinking as rapidly as it does in other paits. 



For the greater part of the year they are perfectly dry with a thin surface 

 film broken up into curled glistening flakes oi-, where the clayey mud is thicker, 

 fissures perhaps a foot in depth run down Ix'tween roughly hexagon.al masses of 

 hardened earth, which on their surface bear the im})iints of the animals — Enuis or 

 Kangaroos — which ci'ossed them while they were still moist, in search of the last 

 remnants of water. 



As we passed by these in the dry season everything was parched and silent, 



with no sign of animal life. The dead shells of molluscs, the oarapaces of 



Estherias, and the foot marks of frogs showed that they had once contained an 



abundance of animal life. Their margins were bordeied by withered shrubs of 



Chenopodium, by tussocks of yellow dried up grass and often by the dried leaves 



and hard wooden seeds of the Nardoo plant. 



*2 



