evidently languishing from the want of moisture. The soil over which we
travelled was far from bad, but there was a total absence of water upon
it. At 6 p.m. Oxley's Table Land was distant from us about fifteen miles,
bearing S. 20 E. by compass.

We had not touched upon the creek from the time we left it in the morning,
having wandered from it in a northerly direction, along a native path that
we intersected, and that seemed to have been recently trodden, since
footsteps were fresh upon it. At sunset, we crossed a broad dry creek that
puzzled us extremely, and were shortly afterwards obliged to stop for the
night upon a plain beyond it. We had, during the afternoon, bent down to
the S.W. in hopes that we should again have struck upon New Year's Creek;
and, under an impression that we could not be far from it, Mr. Hume and I
walked across the plain, to ascertain if it was sufficiently near to be of
any service to us. We came upon a creek, but could not decide whether it
was the one for which we had been searching, or another.

Its bed was so perfectly even that it was impossible to say to what point
it flowed, more especially as all remains of debris had mouldered away. It
was, however, extremely broad, and evidently, at times, held a furious
torrent. In the centre of it, at one of the angles, we discovered a pole
erected, and at first thought, from the manner in which it was propped up,
that some unfortunate European must have placed it there as a mark to tell
of his wanderings, but we afterwards concluded that it might be some
superstitious rite of the natives, in consequence of the untowardness of
the season, as it seemed almost inconceivable that an European could have
wandered to such a distance from the located districts in safety.

REACH A LARGE RIVER.