HIS UNSUCCESSFUL SEARCH FOR WATER. 373 
to fetch up the tired horse, whilst I attended to the 
other, and put the solitary sheep in for the night. 
By a little after dark all was arranged, and the 
horse that had been left behind once more with 
the others. 
From the overseer I learnt, that during the fifty 
miles he had retraced our route to obtain the pro- 
visions we had left, he had five times dug for 
water : four times he had found salt water, and once 
he had been stopped by rock. The last effort of this 
kind he had made not far from where we found 
water on the 30th of March, and I could not but be 
struck with the singular and providential circum- 
stance of our first halting and attempting to dig for 
water on that day in all our distress, at the very 
first place, and at the only place, within the 160 
miles we had traversed, where water could have been 
procured. It will be remembered, that in our 
advance, we had travelled a great part of the latter 
portion of this distance by night, and that thus 
there was a probability of our having passed unknow- 
ingly some place where water might have been pro- 
cured. The overseer had now travelled over the same 
ground in daylight, with renovated strength, and in 
a condition comparatively strong, and fresh for exer- 
tion. He had dug wherever he thought there was 
a chance of procuring water, but without success in 
any one single instance. 
After learning all the particulars of the late un- 
lucky journey, I found that a great part of the things 
