34 
Report of the Expedition 
and flooded gum, along its banks. We never bad met, nor did 
we meet another brook like it again. 
About three miles further we crossed the “ Nicholson,” called 
so in honour of Dr. William A. Nicholson, of Bristol, who had 
enabled me to come to Australia to explore it, and to study its 
nature. Its bed is one hundred yards broad, sandy, with magni¬ 
ficent drooping trees; a shallow runuing stream, flood-marks 
fifteen feet eight inches high, a chain of fine lotus lagoons parallel 
to its banks, which are accompanied by fine box flats at its left. 
The salt-water rivers which I had crossed, as well as those 
which I have still to mention, are very broad (150, 200, and 300 
yards;) but they were easily fordable after one or two travelling 
upwards, the fords generally being formed by rocky bars crossing 
the rivers. These fords were generally indicated by fisheries of 
the natives, sticks having been stuck close to each other to form 
a sort of hedge, preventing the fish from returning with the tide, 
or stone walls having been formed by heaping loose stones on 
each other. At the head of the salt water the bed of these rivers 
usually enlarged, and frequently it was formed by two or three 
deep chasms, separated by high bergues. One channel either 
contained a running stream of fresh water, lined by pandanus and 
the drooping tea-tree, or it had just ceased running, a chain of 
fine water-holes still remaining. 
From the Nicholson to the Roper (latitude 14 deg. 50 min., 
longitude 135 deg. 10 min.) we travelled through a country, in 
part miserably scrubby, in part covered by a dense tea-tree forest 
and by sfringy-bark forest, which was sometimes open, but gene¬ 
rally scrubby, and rendered difficult for passage by a dense under¬ 
wood. There was particularly a leguminous shrub, from two, 
three, to five feet high, with a winged stem, and branches, leaf¬ 
less, with yellow blossoms (like Bossieea scolopendrium,) which 
composed the scrub and underwood of this country. Several 
species of scrubby acaciee and several grevilleas were very frequent. 
The vegetation preserves the same character all along the west 
side of the gulf, across the Arnhem Peninsula, and up to Port 
Essington, wherever the soil is similar. Along large rivers the 
