when the packs were heavy, it took us thirty minutes from the time Breaden and Warri brought the camels in to the time we were ready to start; Breaden, Charlie, Warri, and I loading, whilst Godfrey, who acted as cook, got his pots and pans together and packed the “tucker-bags.”  There is little of interest in this scrub; an occasional plant perhaps attracts one’s attention.  Here and there a vine-like creeper (an Asclepiad) trails upon the ground.  With the fruits of this, commonly called cotton-pods, the black-fellows vary their diet of grubs and the very rare emu or kangaroo.  The skin, the edible part, is soft, thick, and juicy, and has quite a nice sweet taste.  The blacks eat them raw or roasted in wood-ashes.  The seeds are of a golden yellow, and are joined on to a silky fibrous core.  When bruised the pod exudes a white, milky juice.

Numerous large spiders inhabit the scrubs and build their webs from tree to tree; wonderfully strong they are too, and so frequent as to become a nuisance to whoever is walking first.  It is quite unpleasant when one’s eyes are fixed on the compass, to find, on looking up, that one’s hat has swept off a great web, whose owner runs over one, furious at unprovoked assault.  Though I got the full benefit of these insects, I was never bitten; they may or may not be poisonous, but look deadly enough, being from one to four inches from toe to toe.  The scrubs for the most part are thick and without a break for many miles.  Sometimes open country is met with—­not always a welcome change.

July 26th the thickets became more and more open until we came across a narrow salt-lake; by leading each camel separately we reached the other side without mishap, and congratulated ourselves on our good fortune, until the next morning when we found that our camp had been on an island; and the lake stretched North and South as far as the eye could reach, until lake and sky became one in a shimmering mirage.  I think it probable that this lake joins the Eastern portion of Lake Darlot, which lies to the N.N.W., and connects with the narrow lake seen by Luck and myself in 1894, to the S.S.E.  Whatever its extent there was no doubt about its nature; from 8.30 until 1.30 we were occupied in hauling, digging out, and dragging our camels, and in humping on our backs some 5,000 lbs. weight of packs, across a channel not half a mile wide.  Camels vary very much in their ability to cross bogs.  Those which take small steps succeed best; the majority take steps of ordinary length and, in consequence, their hind feet slide into the hole left by the fore, and in an instant they are pinned by the hind leg up to the haunch.  Kruger was splendid, and simply went through by main force, though he eventually sank close to the shore.  I had carried over some of the loading, amongst it my camera, and was just in time to take a snapshot as he was sinking.  Shiddi, the cunning old rogue, could not be persuaded across; he would try the ground with one foot and then draw back like a timid bather.  We left him roaring to his mates and yet afraid to join them, until we were ready to start again.  As soon as he saw the caravan disappear over the sandhill which abutted on the lake, he took a desperate plunge and came through with ease.