sations of delightful
excitement, to which we have before alluded, and which naturally called
forth strong emotions of regret in those who were denied a participation
in the feverish enjoyment of discovery.

From the highest tree at Captain Wickham's furthest point, the appearance
of the country was, as far as the eye could reach, one wearisome level,
broken to the southward, at a distance of ten miles, by a rocky mound
about 150 feet high.

UPPER PART OF THE RIVER.

The river, which for some distance had not been fifty yards wide, with a
rocky bed in places, and banks from six to twenty feet high, was subject
at this point to a tidal change of level of about three feet, but there
was no perceptible stream, and the water which a few miles lower down had
been muddy, was here quite clear. Small bamboos and other drift were
observed in the branches of the trees eight or ten feet above the water,
showing the height which the river attains at some seasons of the year.
By the hollows on many of the plains, water appeared to have lain some
time, and doubtless parts of this low land were periodically overflowed.

On the point dividing the upper branches of the river some coarse sand
was washed up, which on examination was found to be of a granitic
character, clearly showing the primary formation of the country through
which the Adelaide flowed. The only rocks noticed in the parts traversed
by the boats were, as I have before said, of red porous sandstone. The
smoke of several large fires was observed up the country, but none of the
natives were seen.

MONKEY-BIRDS.

Towards the upper part of the river they noticed a strange bird, very
much like a guineafowl in size and manner of running along the ground.
The colour was speckled white and brown. This, doubtless, from Mr.
Bynoe's description of one he wounded on the coast in the neighbourhood
of the Adelaide, must have been the Leipoa ocellata of Gould, one of the
mound or tumuli-building birds, first seen in Western Australia by Mr.
George Moore, and afterwards on the North-west coast, and in South
Australia by Captain Grey. Although known to range over a large expanse
of the continent, this was the first time it was discovered in Northern
Australia.

In the reaches where the bamboo grew, flights of large vampires
(resembling the Pteropus rubricollis of Geoff.) were met with: they kept
continually flying to and fro close over the boats as they passed up,
making a screec