DISAPPOINTED OF SUPPLIES. 
215 
Thus, it will appear, that we regained the place from 
which we started in seventy-seven days, during which, we 
could not have pulled less than 2000 miles. It is not for 
me, however, to make any comment, either on the dangers 
to which w’e were occasionally exposed, or the toil and pri- 
vations we continually experienced in the course of this 
expedition. My duty is, simply to give a plain narrative of 
facts, which I have done with fidelity, and with as much 
accuracy as circumstances would permit. Had we found 
Robert Harris at the depot, I should have considered it 
unnecessary to trespass longer on the patient reader, but 
as our return to that post did not relieve us from our diffi- 
culties, it remains for me to carry on the narrative of our 
proceedings to the time when we reached the upper branches 
of the Morumbidgee. 
The hopes that had buoyed up the spirits of the men, 
ceased to operate as soon as they were discovered to have 
been ill founded. The most gloomy ideas took possession of 
their minds, and they fancied that we had been neglected, 
and that Harris had remained in Sydney. It was to no 
purpose that I explained to them that my instructions did 
not bind Harris to come beyond Pontebadgery, and that I 
was confident he was then encamped upon that plain. 
We had found the intricate navigation of the Morum- 
bidgee infinitely more distressing than the hard pulling up 
the open reaches of the Murray, for we were obliged to 
haul the boat up between numberless trunks of tiees, an 
operation that exhausted the men much more than rowing. 
