Page:Tracks of McKinlay and party across Australia.djvu/213

   "Sir,—I beg to state that I have had communication with Adelaide, and have received papers from there intimating the relief of King, the only survivor of the Melbourne Gulf of Carpentaria party, and an announcement that the Melbourne Government were likely to have the remains of the late gentlemen removed from this creek to Melbourne to receive a public burial and monument to their memory; and at the same time stating their intention of establishing a depôt somewhere on this creek to await the arrival of one or other of the parties (in search of the late Burke and Wills) from Rockhampton, or the Albert, on the Gulf of Carpentaria.

"I beg to state I am with my party stationed on a lake about eighty-five miles westerly of this, and immediately on my return there I start northward; and for the first part of my journey a little to east of north, and will at every suitable camp on my route bury documents conveying the intelligence meant to be conveyed to either of the parties by the depot party likely to be formed here of the fate of the late party, by which means they will be put in possession of the facts, and can return to the Albert or go on through to Adelaide. There is at present, and will be for some time to come, easy access to Adelaide by my route, which the wheel tracts of my cart have clearly defined.

"By this means of intimation to the parties in question, it will relieve the party about to be stationed here from the necessity of passing a summer in this hot region. My course will intersect any course either of the parties out from the northward can make between Eyre's Creek and the late Burke's depot on this creek.

"I beg to remain, sir, "Your most obedient servant, "JOHN McKINLAY, "Leader of the S. A. B. R. Expedition."

9th. Started 7·25, followed creek down, and passed Goonooboorroo water-hole; passed flooded