186 
RECENT AUSTRALIAN EXPLORATIONS, [March 22 , 1858. 
to explore the Mount Serle district for gold and for coal, and in the 
course of that exploration Mr. Babbage made a rapid reconnaissance 
to the northward. After considerable danger and difficulty, owing 
to the desertion of his native servant and the loss of his horses, he 
succeeded in reaching and discovering M £ Donnell Creek and the 
large and apparently permanent waters of St. Mary’s Pool and 
Blanche- water, lying on its lower course. Much excitement was 
caused at Adelaide by the news of this discovery, an account of 
which was published in the £ Register ’ newspaper, from which 
journal it will be sufficient to extract the following remarks, dated 
November 7, 1856 : — 
“ At a distance of not more than six or eight miles from Eyre’s 
track, over what was presumed to be a parched and thirsty country, 
Mr. Babbage has been fortunate enough to discover a fine sheet of 
permanent water, a mile long, surrounded by detached pools of 
permanent water. These result from a fine creek, having its sources 
full 60 miles higher up, and watering the country through which it 
passes. We invite renewed attention to this subject, not only because 
it is due to Mr. Babbage, but because it shows the impropriety of con- 
demning vast tracts of country where no water was found by some 
traveller, who years ago struck a path across their solitudes. If large 
sheets of water, fed by a creek 60 miles long, existed in the imme- 
diate vicinity of Eyre’s track without being discovered or sus- 
pected by that enterprising traveller, the same natural features may 
now exist in other places, though as yet unseen and unknown by 
white men. We sincerely hope that Mr. Babbage’s discovery may 
prompt bushmen and others to make occasional excursions into 
those localities, which perhaps on insufficient evidence have been 
condemned as unproductive. Many districts are now covered with 
flocks which years ago were denounced as hopelessly sterile.” 
Nothing further appears to have been discovered in these regions 
until Mr. Goyder’s expedition in the following year, 1857, an 
account of which was read before this Society last November, and 
which is already published in the Proceedings. It will be recol- 
lected that Mr. Goyderwas the assistant-surveyor sent to triangulate 
the country north of Mount Serle, and that, after operations were 
commenced, he took the opportunity of making a general recon- 
naissance of the districts in which his duties lay. He descended 
M‘Donnell Creek, and recorded his admiration of the abundance of 
the water in it, and also at Blanche-water. He followed the creek for 
16 miles, and then leaving it travelled 6j- miles to the north-east, 
and came upon the margin of Lake Torrens. He found the water 
quite fresh, and an entire absence of marks of higher flood-lines, 
