138 Kennedy's expedition. 



two and a-half to three inches broad, beautifully 

 veined, and with axillary racemes of white, sweet- 

 scented flowers j the seed being a large round nut 

 with a thin rind, of a yellowish green colour when 

 ripe. There ^\ere many other interesting plants 

 gTowing about, but the afternoon turning out wet, 

 I left their examination to stand over till finer 

 weather. 



Growing on the beach was a species oi Portulaca, 

 a quantity of the young shoots of which I collected, 

 and we partook of them at our supper, boiled as a 

 vegetable. 



In the evening, after watering our horses, we took 

 them to the camp and gave each of them a feed of 

 corn which Ave had brought with us for the purpose 

 of strengthening them previous to our starting- from 

 Rockingham Bay, on our expedition ; but although 

 the grass on which they had been depasturing was 

 coarse, they were with diflficulty induced to eat the 

 corn, many of them leaving it almost all behind 

 them. We then tethered them and folded our 

 sheep, one of which we killed for food. The ration 

 per week on which the party was now put, was one 

 hundred pounds of flour, twentj^-six pounds of sugar, 

 and three and a-half pounds of tea, with one sheep 

 every alternate Asij. 



This night too we commenced our nightly watch, 

 the whole of the stores being landed and packed in 

 the camp. During nearly the whole of the day a 

 tribe of natives was watching our movements, but 



