that fell down the other day and ascertaining whether he is dead or alive; if alive to get him brought on here; and if much disabled to have him killed and jerked as soon as the weather clears and the sun shines out sufficiently for that purpose.  Found bullock within a quarter of a mile of where he was left, able just to stand and no more; I will send out tomorrow afternoon and have him killed where he is and his flesh brought in here the morning following for the purpose of jerking it; he appears good beef.  The country boggy; in the afternoon rode down to the creek through a good deal of water to ascertain the state of the flood, and had to swim some distance to get to the main creek; when I got there I was glad to find that not only had it, for the present, arrived at its height, but had gone down nearly nine inches.  The last time this country was flooded it was about seven feet higher (perpendicularly) than it was this time, and the sand and stone hills were flooded for several feet up their sides from their base.  Wind still from south-east by east, with an occasional slight passing shower, but symptoms of clearing up.  This country is perfectly infested with wild dogs; and fortunately for us it is that I happened to have some strychnine, it plays great havoc amongst them; so voracious are they that when one of their fellows die the others fall to and devour him; by this means many are destroyed.  Middleton recovering but very slowly; he continues to have a very troublesome diarrhoea—­aggravated no doubt by being obliged for the last few days to be nearly always wet; sometimes even to swim clothes and all, and remaining in that condition till the camp was brought here and fixed; I should be sorry if anything were to happen to him as he is an invaluable man in such a party as this.

Tuesday, March 4.

Wind a little more east; shod some of the horses yesterday and some this morning.  Four of the party after dinner started to kill the bullock; camp there and return in the morning with the meat when cold.  I with Poole rode out to some high stone hills eastward to endeavour to get a view of the creek and ascertain, if possible, from which quarter it principally flows.  After getting to top of the highest, from which one gets very extensive view to the north-east, there was a slight haze that prevented me positively ascertaining its actual course; there is very heavy timber on a bearing of 35 degrees, and appears surrounded by hills.  The haze was so bad that I could not be certain; however I must travel in that direction first and trust that it suddenly turns round to the north; from this last point to a point 20 degrees west of north is a perfect sea, nothing but isolated trees showing above the water; I found the ground exceedingly soft, almost impassable in many places.  On the tableland, at the foot of the high stone-hills I ascended, are lines of creeks forming the drainage of the country, thickly timbered with myall, and (for the place) a considerable