CHAPTER IX.
AUSTRALIA TRAVERSED: TROPICAL DISTRICT.
Editor's Introductory Remarks; the Approach to the Sea; Tropical features; the Leichhardt; Aborigines, etc.—April 22nd, etc., Still Cold Weather—23rd, Sarah's Bange—25th, Marchant's Creek—26th, William's Creek—27th Elder's Creek—28th, Poole's Creek; Elephant, McPherson, and Margaret Mounts—30th, Jessie and Jeannie Creeks—May 2nd, William Creek—4th, Davis Creek—6th, The Leichhardt River—8th, Start's Pigeons—12th, Baggage on Fire in Grass-burning; Description of the Leichhardt—18th, Indications of nearing the Sea—19th, 20th, Unable to reach it—21st, Start for return Journey.
"We might expect some enthusiasm in the contents of this chapter, as the party approached the goal of all their exertions, and had the hope of presently emerging upon the northern sea. Our travellers, however, plod on without much troubling the poetry of the occasion. As they descend the Leichhardt, the first of the known gulf streams they have made, they find a gradually increasing rise of the tidal wave, until, on the 18th May, the salt water comes in upon them like a sluice, running through the mangrove creeks.
