Interior of New Holland. 
187 
most vivid green. There was scarcely any water in the channel 
of the Darling ; but the grass existed to its edgedown banks, as 
regular in their slope as any fortification. Graceful, but not 
large trees, drooped over them, like willows, and the scene was 
admired by the whole party. 
We had been informed by the natives of Lake Victoria, of the 
massacre of a party of overlanders, at the lagoons of the Darling, 
near Williorara; and this report was confirmed by a tribe of 
thieves, whom we found at the head of the Ana-branch. I felt it 
necessary, therefore, to take additional precautions in my advance 
up the river, and made such dispositions as to prevent the pos¬ 
sibility of surprise. In consequence of this rumour, however, I 
was anxious to hurry on, but the nature of the ground over which 
we had to travel, necessarily impeded my progress. The flats in 
the immediate precincts of the river still wore a beautiful and 
verdant appearance, each succeeding one looking still more like a 
grassy lawn ; but the outer flats were perfectly bare, and thinly 
scattered with box trees. The soil was rotten, blistered, and full 
of holes, so numerous and so close together, that it was im¬ 
possible to avoid them ; so that the poor animals were shaken to 
pieces by the heavy fall of the drays into the deep fissures tra¬ 
versing the flats, and the labour was so great that our journeys 
were necessarily short. These flats are more extensive than those 
of the Murray; but whether, at any time, they wear the same 
luxuriant appearance as those nearer the stream, I will not take 
on myself to say; they were uniformly bounded by sandy desert, 
portions of which were covered with low and stunted bush. As 
I have already observed, when we first came on the Darling, 
there was scarcely any water in it; and its current was so very 
feeble that it could hardly be said to maintain one. Some few 
days after our arrival on its banks, Mr. Browne and I were 
looking at it, where its breadth was so small that we could 
almost have jumped across it. We observed, however, on this 
occasion, that the waters seemed to be propelled by some back 
impulse. There was grass and bark floating on it, and other 
forerunners of an approaching fresh, though neither did I or Mr. 
Browne anticipate the result. That evening the Darling scarcely 
