ched water,
and in which he must have stood while allaying his burning thirst, were
very plain in the mud! The scales of some large fish lay upon them, and I
could not but hope that even the most savage natives would have fed a
white man circumstanced as Mr. Cunningham must then have been. Overseer
Burnett, Whiting and The Doctor proceeded in search of him down the river
while the party continued, as well as the dense scrubs of casuarinae
permitted, in a direction parallel to its course. Just as we found Mr.
Cunningham's footsteps a column of smoke arose from the woods to the
southward, and I went in search of the natives, Bulger accompanying me
with his musket. After we had advanced in the direction of the smoke two
miles it entirely disappeared, and we could neither hear nor see any
other traces of human beings in these dismal solitudes. The density of
the scrubs had obliged me to make some detours to the left, so that I did
not reach the Bogan till long after it was quite dark. Those who had gone
in search of Mr. Cunningham did not arrive at our camp that night
although we sent up several skyrockets and fired some shots.

May 1.

The party came in from tracing Mr. Cunningham's steps along the dry bed
of the Bogan, and we were glad to find that the impressions continued.
There appeared to be the print of a small naked foot of someone either
accompanying or tracking Mr. Cunningham. At one place were the remains of
a small fire, and the shells of a few mussels, as if he had eaten them.
It was now most desirable to get ahead of this track, and I lost no time
in proceeding, to the extent of another day's journey, parallel to the
Bogan or, rather, so as to cut off a great bend of it.

DEATH OF THE KANGAROO.

We crossed some good undulating ground, open and grassy, the scenery
being finer, from the picturesque grouping and character of the trees,
than any we had hitherto seen. On one of these open tracts I wounded a
female kangaroo at a far shot of my rifle, and the wretched animal was
finally killed after a desperate fight with the dogs.

REFLECTIONS.

There is something so affecting in the silent and deadly struggle between
the harmless kangaroo and its pursuers that I have sometimes found it
difficult to reconcile the sympathy such a death excites with our
possession of canine teeth, or our necessities, however urgent they might
be.

The huntsman's pleasure is no more, indeed, when such an animal dies thus
befor