Page:Tracks of McKinlay and party across Australia.djvu/97

 ADELAIDE TO BLANCHEWATER.

The reader has learned from our Introduction the lamentable mischance that left Burke and his party to perish at Cooper's Creek. The intelligence received in the colonies that Brahe and Wright had left the depot at the Cooper without learning anything of the missing party, excited general concern. The Victoria Government took prompt measures to prosecute a further search; and in order to make this search as complete as possible, expeditions were organized to proceed by both the north and the south. Mr. Alfred Howitt, an experienced Australian explorer, was ordered off at once to Cooper's Creek, while further expeditions were being prepared for a march to commence from the Gulf of Carpentaria. Mr. Walker was fitted out for a journey from Rockhampton, on the eastern coast of