2 
OBJECTS OF THE EXPEDITION. 
and herds to distant tracts for pasture and water, neither 
remaining for them in the located districts. The interior 
suffered equally with the coast, and men, at length, began 
to despond under so alarming a visitation. It almost ap- 
peared as if the Australian sky were never again to be tra- 
versed by a cloud. 
But, however severe for the colony the seasons had 
proved, or were likely to prove, it was borne in mind at 
this critical moment, that the wet and swampy state of 
the interior had alone prevented Mr. Oxley from penetrat- 
ing further into it, in 1818. Each successive report from 
Wellington Valley, the most distant settlement to the N.W ., 
confirmed the news of the unusually dry state of the low- 
lands, and of the exhausted appearance of the streams fall- 
ing into them. It was, consequently, hoped that an expe- 
dition, pursuing the line of the Macquarie, would have a 
greater chance of success than the late Surveyor General 
had ; and that the difficulties he had to contend against 
would be found to be greatly diminished, if not altogether 
removed. The immediate fitting out of an expedition was 
therefore decided upon, for the express purpose of ascer- 
taining the nature and extent of that basin into which the 
Macquarie was supposed to fall, and whether any connection 
existed between it and the streams falling westerly. As I 
had early taken a great interest in the geography of New 
South Wales, the Governor was pleased to appoint me to 
the command of this expedition. 
In the month of September, 1828, 1 received his Ex- 
