PREPARATIONS. 
3 
The fitting out of another expedition was accordingly 
determined upon; and about the end of September 1829, 
I received the Governor’s instructions to make the neces- 
sary preparations for a second descent into the interior, for 
the purpose of tracing the Morumbidgee, or such rivers as 
it might prove to be connected with, as far as practicable. 
In the event of failure in this object, it was hoped that an 
attempt to regain the banks of the Darling on aN.ff. 
course from the point at which the expedition might be 
thwarted in its primary views, would not be unattended with 
success. Under any circumstances, however, by pursuing 
these measures, an important part of the colony would ne- 
cessarily be traversed, of which the features were as yet al- 
together unknown. 
It became my interest and my object to make the expe- 
dition as complete as possible, and, as far as in me lay, 
to provide for every contingency : and as it appeared to me 
that, in all likelihood, we should in one stage or other of our 
journey have to trust entirely to water conveyance, I deter- 
mined on taking a whale-boat, whose dimensions and strength 
should in some measure be proportioned to the service re- 
quired. I likewise constructed a small still for the distilla- 
tion of water, in the event of our finding the water of the 
Darling salt, when we should reach its banks. The whale- 
boat, after being fitted, was taken to pieces for more conve- 
nient carriage, as has been more particularly detailed in the 
last chapter of the preceding volume. 
So little danger had been apprehended from the natives 
b 2 
