APPENDIX. NO. V. 213 
have placed Oxley’s Table Land in latitude 29° 57' 30", 
longitude 15° 43' 30". 
Finding it impracticable to move westward from the 
hill, I again descended on the creek, whose general 
course was to the north-west, in which direction we at 
length struck upon a river whose appearance raised our 
most sanguine expectations. It flowed round an angle from 
the north-east to the north-west, and extended in longitude 
five reaches as far as we could see. At that place it was 
about sixty yards broad, with banks of from thirty to forty 
feet high, and it had numerous wild fowl and many pelicans 
on its bosom, and seemed to be full of fish, while the paths 
of the natives on both sides, like well-trodden roads, showed 
how numerous they were about it. On tasting its waters, 
however, we found them perfectly salt, and useless to us, 
and as our animals had been without water the night be- 
fore, this circumstance distressed us much ; our first day’s 
journey led us past between sixty and seventy huts in one 
place, and on our second we fell in with a numerous tribe of 
natives, having previously seen some between two creeks 
before we made New-Year’s Range. At some places the 
water proved less salt than at others ; our animals drank of 
it sparingly : we found two small fresh-water holes, which 
served us as we passed. After tracing the river for a con- 
siderable distance, we came on brine springs in the bed of 
it, the banks having been encrusted with salt from the 
first ; and as the difficulty of getting fresh water was so 
great, I here foresaw an end to our wanderings. And as 
I was resolved not involve ray party in greater distress, I 
halted it, on overtaking the animals, and the next morning 
turned back to the nearest fresh-water, at a distance of 
