356 
Miscellanea. 
pical climate, civilised man could only look for the most scanty 
means of subsistence. The sterile nature of a portion of the 
country, extending to the north of the settlement of South Aus¬ 
tralia, had been to a great extent determined by Lieutenant Eyre, 
but the subsequent researches of Captain Frome, the surveyor- 
general of the colony, have indeed rendered the account still 
more striking, for he has ascertained that what appeared to be 
the south-eastern end of Lake Torrens, was, in fact, a mere sandy 
desert, at a height of 300 feet above the sea, with a few low sand 
ridges rising out of it, which, to him, as well as to Lieutenant 
Eyre, appeared by the refraction of the atmosphere to be a lake 
with islands, until absolutely examined. This desolate tract, in 
which salt water springs abound, and in which fresh water is only 
known in occasional floods, may, I apprehend, be taken as a type 
of large portions of the interior of this singular continent, and 
even in this comparatively narrow portion of it, great must be the 
privations of those who effect a passage from the inland points of 
Southern Australia to that part of the banks of the Darling 
already known to us by the surveys of Mitchell. 
But to return to our object—the traversing of the continent 
from New South Wales to the Gulf of Carpentaria. From what 
point ought the exploratory expedition to start, and which direc¬ 
tion should it take ? 
Commenting upon the relative advantages of a departure either 
from Fort Bourke, the most north-western settlement of the 
colony, or from Moreton Bay, the committee of Sydney, guided 
by the opinion of Sir Thomas Mitchell, give the preference to 
the former. It would ill become me to set up any opinion which 
I may hazard against that of Sir Thomas Mitchell, so distinguished 
for an acquaintance with that country, but I cannot avoid stating 
that Fort Bourke, already a long and tiresome march from Syd¬ 
ney, seems to me to be much too far removed from the eastern 
cordillera, from whence any regular supply of water can be looked 
for. As yet, we know of but one small river on the right bank 
of the Darling, and as the tract N.W. of Fort Bourke is slightly 
elevated, and we also know from the survey of Captain P. King, 
and from recent surveys of Captains Stanley and Stokes, that a 
