436 
Miscellanea. 
natives hereabouts. What led him to wander to the hills it is 
impossible to say; but it almost appeared as if he had been sent 
to encourage us He guessed the use of the boat the moment he 
saw it, and pointed to the north-west as the quarter in which we 
should go. He examined the sheep-netting, and putting his head 
to the meshes, intimated to us by signs that the fish we should 
find were too large to get through them. He recognised 
the turtle, the hippocampus, and several sea-fish, figured in 
Cuvier’s Plates, naming them respectively; but he put his 
fingers on all the others, and gave them a general name. From 
these facts, His Excellency and the Secretary of State will be 
enabled to judge of the prospects before us. Putting my obser¬ 
vations and these together, I cannot but think that we are within 
one hundred and fifty or two hundred miles of some remarkable 
feature; but whether a river or a sea, it is impossible to say. 
On my progress up the Darling, I reduced the allowance of 
flour from ten to eight pounds a-week. In February I reduced 
it to six pounds, with a corresponding reduction in the other 
articles of consumption ; and in March, I again reduced the flour 
to five pounds; below which I should be reluctant to go. These 
measures have left me with a supply to the present date of twenty- 
six weeks’ provisions ; but as, in the event of our finding any sea 
or river, that time — twelve weeks of which would necessarily be 
occupied in our homeward return—would be too limited to enable 
me to prosecute any important discovery, I have therefore deter¬ 
mined on sending a third of my party back to Adelaide, under 
the charge of Mr. Poole, whose strength has, I am sorry to say, 
failed him. I should, under such circumstances, have adopted 
this plan, however much I might have felt the loss of Mr. Poole’s 
services. This reduction in the number of my party will give me 
an additional supply of provisions for two months, with which I 
shall have it in my power to advance into the heart of the interior. 
I trust that Lord Stanley will approve this step : it will only put 
the Government to the expense of wages for nine men, not in¬ 
cluding the officers, for the period we may stay out over and 
above the year. I could not bring myself to abandon the enter¬ 
prise in so advanced and prosperous a stage; and I have been 
