penetrating through the reeds, that could by any possible exaggeration
have been laid down as the bed of the river, that I detached Mr. Hume; and
the account he brought me at once confirmed my opinion in regard to the
Macquarie, and I thenceforth gave up every hope of ever seeing it in its
characteristic shape again.

Independently however of all circumstantial evidence, it was clear that
the river had not re-formed at a distance of twenty-five miles to the
north of us, since Mr. Hume had gone to the westward of that point, at
about the same distance on his late journey, without having observed the
least appearance of reeds or of a river. He had, indeed, noticed a hollow,
which occasionally contained water, but he saw nothing like the bed of a
permanent stream. I became convinced, also, from observation of the
country through which we had passed, that the sources of the Macquarie
could not be of such magnitude as to give a constant flow to it as a
river, and at the same time to supply with water the vast concavity into
which it falls. In very heavy rains only could the marshes and adjacent
lands be laid wholly under water, since the evaporation alone would be
equal to the supply.

The great plains stretching for so many miles to the westward of Mount
Harris, even where they were clear of reeds, were covered with shells and
the claws of cray-fish and their soil, although an alluvial deposit, was
superficially sandy. They bore the appearance not only of frequent
inundation, but of the floods having eventually subsided upon them. This
was particularly observable at the bottom of the marshes. We did not find
any accumulation of rubbish to indicate a rush of water to any one point;
but numerous minor channels existed to distribute the floods equally and
generally over every part of the area subject to them, and the marks of
inundation and subsidence were everywhere the same. The plain we had last