Page:Tracks of McKinlay and party across Australia.djvu/58

 flat—the highest land along the Flinders being not more than from 1000 to 1500 feet in elevation, while the dividing range itself was not of greater height.

The rainy season of this promising country was found to begin in January, and end in April or the beginning of May; and as there had been considerable rainfall prior to the expedition's visit, everything looked to great, and, perhaps, more than usual, advantage. Leichhardt, who about seventeen years before, traversed all the country bordering on the Gulf of Carpentaria, gave a less favourable account, as he saw it during the dry season. He alludes to the creeks as being salt, and to the vast plains as imperfectly supplied with fresh water; remarking, however, at the same time, that the indications of a numerous aboriginal population would augur better for the country's qualities. The drought which Landsborough found prevailing at the Warrego and Darling rivers had extended eastwards into those parts of the settled territory of Queensland and New South Wales that were situated in the same latitudes.

Landsborough speaks rather more disparagingly than his fellow-travellers of the aborigines, regarding them as alike insatiably greedy and incurably treacherous. While the expedition was at the Herbert, about a hundred of them came swarming around the camp, all fully armed after their own