now conducting the expedition in quest of the
remains of Dr. Leichhardt. Pushing on twelve miles further, we halted for
the night in latitude 23 degrees 59 minutes 39 seconds. Tobacco here grew
to sufficient size for manufacture, occupying many hundred acres of the
best land; a plant much resembling stramonium was also abundant on the
moist land, yielding a strongly offensive odour from its leaves.

1st June.

For the first twelve miles along the river the flats much improved, and
were only occasionally broken up by stony ridges; good country was seen
to extend up the tributaries, several of which came in from the north. To
the south, at two or three miles distant, and running parallel to the
river for many miles, was an even grassy range of moderate elevation
nearly destitute of trees or bushes; the acacia and melaleuca, which had
hitherto generally covered the plains, was evidently fast giving way to
an open undulating and thinly-grassed country, the back lands being
however still too stony to yield much pasture, the summer grass being
already parched and dry, the flats alone continuing moist and verdant.

At our noon halt the main river had ceased to flow, but a tributary
coming from the north-east had a small stream still running in the bottom
of a muddy channel down which the recent floods had brought flags and
portions of bulrush, the only instance throughout the district in which
we had observed them.

The next ten miles passed over between this and sunset was chiefly an
alluvial flat, much resembling the fertile lands near the mouth of the
Greenough; the acacias and several varieties of melaleuca, amongst which
was the Callistemon phoeniceus, with its beautiful scarlet flowers, were
growing with tropical luxuriance, the soil in many places being still
saturated with moisture. A water-melon was here first observed, the fruit
not attaining to more than two inches in length, but not otherwise
differing from the cultivated kinds; we also found a fruit in shape like
a pear, three inches in length, growing on a small creeper, the interior
of the fruit consisting of a number of small flat seeds, to which were
attached a bundle of long silky fibres resembling cotton. Our bivouac was
in latitude 24 degrees 7 minutes 52 seconds, near a fine pool of fresh
water, with limestone cropping out in a thin bed on the banks; we had
frequently met with it distributed in small nodules scattered over a
large portion of the country