fires for the purpose of burning off the old spinifex to allow young feed
to grow and so attract the rats to a known locality; or it might be that
the blacks were burning the country to hunt out the rats and lizards. On
the 25th a sudden change took place, and we found ourselves in a small,
open thicket with a coarse undergrowth of grass, and scattered about were
a few boulders of decomposed granite and occasional low outcrops of rock.
Several old native camps put us on the alert, and presently we found a
well--a shallow hole, 7 feet deep, and 2 feet 6 inches in diameter,
entirely surrounded by high spinifex. Why there should ever be water
there, or how the blacks got to know of it, was a problem we could only
guess at. Everything looked so dry and parched that we were in no way
surprised at finding the well waterless. Prempeh had been very unwell
lately, refusing to take what little feed there was to be got. A dose of
sulphur and butter was administered, poured warm down his throat by me as
Breaden held open his month, grasped firmly by either lip. I believe
sulphur is an excellent thing for camels, and used often to treat them
to the mixture, some--Satan, for example--being very partial to it. The
position of this well I found to be lat. 25 degrees 15 minutes, long.
124 degrees 48 minutes; from the edge of the mulga, one hundred yards or
so to the North of it, a range of rough looking hills is visible. This I
named the Browne Range, after my old friends at Bayley's Reward, and the
two conspicuous points I christened Mount Gordon, after Mr. Gordon Lyon,
and Mount Everard, after Mr. Everard Browne, respectively.

Mount Gordon is flat-topped; and Mount Everard a double hill, a peak
rising from a flat top, bears 82 degrees from the well. This range stood
out boldly from the open country and promised well for hilly country
ahead. Nor were we disappointed, for after two hours' travel we sighted
an imposing-looking range, and altered our course to the highest point, a
queer dome-shaped peak, which we called Charlie's Knob, since he had