RUSSELL RANGE. 
53 
descending to the open downs behind them, I 
steered direct for Cape Arid, cutting off Cape Pas- 
ley, and encamping after a stage of eighteen miles, 
where it bore south-east of us. We halted for the 
night upon a ridge timbered with casuarinse, and 
abounding in grass. Once more we were in 'a 
country where trees were found, and again we were 
able at night to make our fires of large logs, which 
did not incessantly require renewing to prevent 
their going out. We had now crossed the level 
bank which had so long shut out the interior from 
us ; gradually it had declined in elevation, until at 
last it had merged in the surrounding country, and 
we hardly knew where it commenced, or how it 
ended. The high bluff and craggy hills, whose 
tops we had formerly seen, stood out now in bold 
relief, with a low level tract of country stretching 
to their base, covered with dwarf brush, heathy 
plants and grass-tree, with many intervals of open 
grassy land, and abounding in kangaroos. I named 
these lofty and abrupt mountain masses the 44 Rus- 
sell Range,” after the Right Honourable the Secre- 
tary of State for the Colonies — Lord John Russell. 
They constitute the first great break in the charac- 
ter and appearance of the country for many hun- 
dreds of miles, and they offer a point of great 
interest, from, which future researches may hereafter 
be made towards the interior. Nearer to the coast, 
and on either side of Cape Pasley were sand-drifts, 
in which I have no doubt that water might have 
