51 
CHARACTER OF THE COUNTRY. 
having seen not more than fifty in an extent of more 
than 1 80 miles. They are apparently scattered along it in 
families. I was rather surprised that my boy understood 
their language well, since it certainly differed from that 
of the Macquarie tribes, but nevertheless as these people 
do not wander far,^ our information as to what was be- 
fore us was very gradually arrived at, and only as we 
fell in with the successive families. Moreover, as my boy 
was very young, it may be that he was more eager in com- 
municating to those who had no idea of them, the wonders 
he had seen, than in making inquiries on points that were 
indifferent to him. 
We passed a very large plain in the course of the day, 
which was bounded by forests of box, cypress, and the 
acacia pendula, of red sandy soil and parched appear- 
ance. The Morumbidgee evidently overflows a part of the 
lands we crossed, to a greater extent than heretofore, though 
the alluvial deposits beyond its influence were still both 
rich and extensive. The crested pigeon made its appear- 
ance on the acacias, which I took to be a sure sign of our 
approach to a country more than ordinarily subject to over- 
flow ; since on the Macquarie and the Darling, those birds 
were found only to inhabit the regions of marshes, or 
spaces covered by the acacia pendula, or the polygonum. 
We had not, however, yet seen any of the latter plant, 
although we were shortly destined to be almost lost amidst 
fields of it. 
We were now approaching that parallel of longitude in 
F. 2 
