north-west coast, with Sir George Grey in 1837-1839. His labours and
escapes from death by spear-wounds, shipwreck, starvation, thirst, and
fatigue, fill his volumes with incidents of the deepest interest.
Edward Eyre, subsequently known as Governor Eyre, made an attempt to
reach, in 1840-1841, Central Australia by a route north from the city
of Adelaide; and as Sturt imagined himself surrounded by a desert, so
Eyre thought he was hemmed in by a circular or horse-shoe-shaped salt
depression, which he called Lake Torrens; because, wherever he tried
to push northwards, north-westwards, eastwards, or north-eastwards, he
invariably came upon the shores of one of these objectionable and
impassable features. As we now know, there are several of them with
spaces of traversable ground between, instead of the obstacle being
one continuous circle by which he supposed he was surrounded. In
consequence of his inability to overcome this obstruction, Eyre gave
up the attempt to penetrate into Central Australia, but pushing
westerly, round the head of Flinders' Spencer's Gulf, where now the
inland seaport town of Port Augusta stands, he forced his way along
the coast line from Port Lincoln to Fowler's Bay (Flinders), and
thence along the perpendicular cliffs of the Great Australian Bight to
Albany, at King George's Sound.

This journey of Eyre's was very remarkable in more ways than one; its
most extraordinary incident being the statement that his horses
travelled for seven days and nights without water. I have travelled
with horses in almost every part of Australia, but I know that after
three days and three nights without water horses would certainly knock
up, die, or become utterly useless, and it would be impossible to make
them continue travelling. Another remarkable incident of his march is
strange enough. One night whilst Eyre was watching the horses, there
being no water at the encampment, Baxter, his only white companion,
was murdered by two little black boys belonging to South Australia,
who had been with Eyre for some time previously. These little boys
shot Baxter and robbed the camp of nearly all the food and ammunition
it contained, and then, while Eyre was running up from the horses to
where Baxter lay, decamped into the bush and were only seen the
following morning, but never afterwards. One other and older boy, a
native of Albany, whither Eyre was bound, now alone remained. Eyre and
this boy (Wylie) now pushed on in a