sufficient to cause the sudden rise, which therefore must be attributed to heavy falls among the mountains to the east-south-east, from whence I have no doubt it derives its source.  It was most providential that Mr. Evans and his companions crossed the river when they did; a single day might have proved fatal to them.  We would fain lessen to our own imagination the dangers which surround us, and eagerly grasp at every circumstance that tends in any way to enliven our future prospects.  That Providence, whose protection has hitherto been so beneficently extended to us, will, we confidently hope, continue that protection, and lead us in safety to our journey’s end.

Owing most probably to the violent motion it experienced, my chronometer stopped:  this accident was the more to be lamented, as the watch with which I was furnished by the crown had also stopped, and we had now nothing to regulate our time by.

July 26.—­We passed a dreadful night; the elements seemed to be bursting asunder, and we were almost deluged with rain.  Towards noon the weather partially cleared tip.  Our design of moving was however rendered abortive:  we found it impossible to bring the horses near the tents to lade them, and the rain recommencing with great violence, continued throughout the day.  An inmate of an alarming description took up its lodging in our tent during the last night, probably washed out of its hole by the rain:  a large diamond snake was discovered coiled up among the flour bags, four or five feet from the doctor’s bed.

July 27.—­This morning the weather cleared up just in time to enable us to retreat to the river banks in safety, for we were washed out of the tent.  The provisions and heavy baggage were carried by the people to a firmer spot of ground, at which place the horses being lightly laden, we got every thing transported to the river by one o’clock.  Castlereagh River is certainly a stream of great magnitude; its channel is divided by numerous islands covered with trees:  it measured in its narrowest part one hundred and eighty yards, and the flood that had now risen in it was such as to preclude any attempt to cross it.  The outer banks were good firm land, apparently free from floods, and extending not more on this side than a quarter of a mile, when it became wet and marshy:  the banks were from twelve to seventeen feet high, and gradually sloped to the water.  The trees on this firm margin of land were a species of eucalyptus, cypresses, and the sterculia heterophylla, with a few casuarinae.  This river doubtless discharges itself into that interior gulf, in which the waters of the Macquarie are merged:  to that river it is in no respect inferior, and when the banks are full, the body of water in it must be even still more considerable.  Towards evening I thought the waters were falling, which was an event we anxiously looked for, to enable us to proceed to Arbuthnot’s Range, from the heights of which we hoped for an interesting view.  Natives appear to be numerous; their guniahs (or bark-huts) are in every direction, and by their fire-places several muscle-shells of the same kind as those found on the Lachlan and Macquarie Rivers were seen.  Game (kangaroos and emus), frequenting the dry banks of the river, were procured in abundance.