ROCKY SCENERY. 
123 
halted the party at the last good water-hole, which 
was about sixteen miles from our yesterday’s camp. 
We had seen many ducks during the day, two of 
which I shot, and the black boy found a nest with 
fresh eggs in it, so that we fared more luxuriously 
than usual. The night set in very dark and windy, 
but no rain fell. 
August 31. — This morning I sent the overseer 
back to the depot with the cart and two horses, 
whilst I and the native boy proceeded on our route 
on horseback, taking also a man leading a pack- 
horse to carry water for us the first day. Follow- 
ing down the watercourse, we passed through some 
imposing scenery, consisting of cliffs from six to 
eight hundred feet in height, rising perpendicularly 
from their bases, below which were recesses, into 
which the sun never shone, and whose gloomy gran- 
deur imparted a melancholy cast to the thoughts 
and feelings, in unison with the sublimity of the 
scene around. 
After travelling twelve miles from the camp, we 
got clear of the hills, and found an open country 
before us to the north ; through this we proceeded 
for ten miles further, still following the direction of 
the watercourse, and halting upon it for the night, 
after having made a stage of twenty- two miles. 
We had tolerable grass for the horses, but were 
obliged to give them water from the kegs. 
At this place I was much astonished to see four 
white cockatoos, flying about among the gum-trees in 
