Page:Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London, volume 2.djvu/155

 rivers in that 'Great South Land,' must necessarily impede the progress of discovery in the interior of the country.

In closing these geographical remarks on New South Wales, I trust 1 may be permitted to point out the directions in which more extended expeditions of discovery might be employed in that country, and which, if conducted by individuals every way competent to such service, would assuredly put us in possession of such information, as would go far towards showing us the real features and character of central Australia,—its animal and vegetable productions,—the extent to which a region so remote from the coasts is peopled, and that which would not be the least interesting in the inquiries of such exploring parties—its system of rivers.

One expedition might be despatched to follow the course of the Darling, from the point Captain Sturt quitted it in January, 1829; or the party might be directed to trace up, in a northerly direction, the auxiliary stream that falls into the Murray, which was supposed to be the Darling; either would set at rest all doubts respecting the identity of these waters, or furnish clear proof of their being distinct rivers.

A second long and interesting journey might be undertaken, from any one of my points in the Moreton Bay-country, on the western side of the dividing range, to penetrate to the tropic, by pursuing a course as much to the westward of north-west, as the internal country, by furnishing the requisites, grass and water for the animals employed, would permit. An expedition well appointed, and furnished with six months' provisions, and moreover favoured by the country affording wherewithal to sustain animal life, might cross the tropical circle in longitude 140°: upon gaining which, the party might be directed to descend southerly under that meridian to the latitude of Moreton Bay; and, reaching that parallel, to shape a course to the eastward, in order to make the point on the coast-line, from which the expedition had originally taken its departure. In the considerable triangle which such a route would describe, the character of a large tract of internal country would be fully ascertained; and if there are any high lands to the westward of the above-mentioned meridian, which is perhaps very doubtful, these would be seen, and even visited, if not too far remote, and the several rivers, of which there are doubtless many, in four and a half degrees of latitude, flowing inland from the dividing range to the eastward, would, in the progress of such a journey, be repeatedly crossed and their tendency ascertained.

Again; of all the coasts of the continent of Australia, the north-western, as affording encouragement to hope that outlets of internally collected waters might be there discovered, calls for peculiarly minute and patient examination. Upwards of one hundred and thirty years ago, that celebrated navigator, Dampier,