19th August.
The country being very hilly, it was found best to follow down the stream
upon which we had encamped, although it trended to the north of east. In
a few miles the valley opened out with fine pools of permanent water,
covered with numerous flights of ducks, and at eight miles it joined a
wide valley from the south, down which flowed a river, divided into
several channels, containing many fine pools from 50 to 200 yards wide,
which were still running gently from one to another. The banks, although
well grassed, were very rocky, rendering travelling excessively fatiguing
to our heavily-loaded pack-horses, several of them being bruised and
strained while jumping from rock to rock, the clefts being too deep and
narrow for them to walk between, and the ranges bordering the valley were
too steep to admit of our leaving the river, which we were compelled to
follow down to latitude 21 degrees 26 minutes 52 seconds. Camp 62.
20th August.
The river, which had been named the Strelley, continued to hold a
northerly course; we therefore availed ourselves of a smoother valley
coming in from the east to resume our old course. At nine miles we met
with a stream 100 yards wide coming from the south-east, evidently
tributary to the Strelley, and taking its rise in elevated granite ranges
with black volcanic ridges protruding through them, but not to any
considerable height above the general level of the country. After a few
hours' scramble over these ridges we came upon a small stream trending
east, containing several springs, surrounded by high grass and flags,
gradually leading us by sunset into a deep pass, walled in by cliffs and
bluffs from 100 to 300 feet high; the stream, having joined several
larger ones from the southward, now occupying nearly the whole width of
the valley. We encamped in one of the wildest and most romantic-looking
spots to be found in this part of Australia, to which we gave the name of
Glen Herring, from a fish bearing a resemblance to a herring being found
in the stream. Camp 63.
Latitude 21 degrees 20 minutes 35 seconds.