Page:Tracks of McKinlay and party across Australia.djvu/416

 20th. (Camp xx.) Heavy dew again last night. We followed the creek up till we struck a branch. We went up till we came to an impassable barrier of rocks. Here we spelled a short time till Mr. McKinlay returned from a trip beyond the rocks. He told us the country was utterly impassable for animals, so we had to retrace our steps a short distance, and ascend the hillside. On the top we had to stop again to see our way out. Mr. McKinlay went ahead to look out for a road. Off again up the bed of the creek, and camped at a small pool. Another horse knocked up. I think he was ill, for he was a good nag; we had to leave him for he could go no further. The travelling in the sand takes it out of the nags awfully. Distance about ten miles. We saw a few kangaroo to-day.

"'Started at 8·10 ; at three and a quarter miles came to a barrier right across from range to range, and after considerable detention succeeded in finding a road on our left round the range that the barriers form from; at four miles came to where one branch (the largest) comes from the south, with plenty of water in its bed in the stone and rocks; the other branch is considerably to the east, so will try it, although it does not at all look a watery branch, but is much more in the direction I want to go. About same course; over much more open country, hilly, and thinly clad with small iron-bark timber, and is chiefly of slate formation and well grassed, but no water in its bed as far as we went, say about five and a half miles further; where we fortunately got sufficient at the junction of a small side-creek with the main water-course to suit our immediate wants. It"