[Stuart's last Expedition--Frew's Pond--Daly Waters--Arrival at the Sea--The flag at last hoisted on the northern shore--Return--Serious illness of the Leader--The Burke relief Expedition--John M'Kinlay--Native rumours--Discovery of Gray's body--Hodgkinson sent to Blanche Water with the news--Returns with the information of King's rescue by Howitt-- M'Kinlay starts north--Reaches the Gulf coast--Makes for the new Queensland settlements on the Burdekin--Reaches the Bowen River in safety--Mystery of the camel's tracks--Landsborough's expedition-- Discovery of the Gregory River--The Herbert--Return to the Albert depôt-- News of Burke and Wills--Landsborough reduces his party and starts home overland--Returns by way of the Barcoo--Landsborough and his critics--His work as an Explorer--Walker starts from Rockhampton--Another L tree found on the Barcoo--Walker crosses the head of the Flinders--Finds the tracks of Burke and Wills--Tries to follow them up--Returns to Queensland--Abandonment of the desert theory--Private expeditions-- Dalrymple and others.]
On leaving the settled districts, Stuart followed his old track, now so familiar to him, until on the 14th April, 1862, we find him encamped at the upper end of Newcastle Waters, once more about to try to force a passage through the forest of scrub to the north. On the second day he was partly successful, finding an isolated waterhole, surrounded by conglomerate rock. This he called Frew's Pond, and it is now a well-known camping place on the overland telegraph line.
Past this spot he was not able to make any progress; twice he tried hard to reach some tributary of the Victoria River, but failed, and had to spend many long days in fruitlessly riding through dense mulga and hedgewood scrub. At length, after much hope deferred, and finding a few scanty waterholes that did not serve his purpose, he succeeded in striking the head of a chain of ponds running to the north. These being followed down, led him to the head of the creek, called Daly Waters Creek, and finally to the large waterhole bearing that name, where the telegraph station now stands.
Beyond this point the creek was lost in a swamp, and Stuart was unable to find the channel where it re-formed, now known as the Birdum. Missing this watercourse, Stuart worked his way to the eastward, to a creek he called the Strangways, which led him down to the Roper River. This river he crossed, and followed up a northern tributary named by him the Chambers, a name he was so fond of conferring out of gratitude to his constant friend, John Chambers.
His troubles regarding water were now over, but his horses began to fall lame, and he had to carefully husband his stock of spare shoes to carry him back to Adelaide. From the Chambers he came to the Katherine, the lower course of the Flying Fox Creek of Leichhardt, called by Stuart as above, the name it now bears. Thence he struck across the tableland, and descended to the head waters of the river he christened the Adelaide, although at first he thought that he was on the Alligator River. Following the Adelaide, he soon found himself travelling amongst rich tropical scenery, that told him he was at last approaching the coast.
On the 24th July, he went to the north-east, intending to make the sea shore and travel along the beach to the mouth of the Adelaide River. He only told two of the party of the eventful moment awaiting them. As they rode on, Thring, who was ahead, called out, "The sea!" which so took the majority by surprise, that they were some time before they understood what was meant, and then three hearty cheers burst forth.
At this, his first point of contact, Stuart dipped his hands and feet in the sea, and the initials J.M.D.S. were cut on the largest tree they could find. He then attempted to make the mouth of the Adelaide, but found the route too boggy for the horses, and not seeing the utility of fatiguing them for nothing, had a space cleared where they were, and a tall sapling stripped of its boughs for a flagstaff; on this he hoisted the Union Jack he had carried with him. A memorial of the visit was then buried at the foot of the impromptu staff. It was an air-tight tin case containing the following paper:--
"South Australian Great Northern Exploring Expedition.--The exploring party, under the command of John M'Dowall Stuart, arrived at this spot on the 25th day of July, 1862, having crossed the entire continent of Australia, from the Southern to the Indian Ocean, passing through the centre. They left the city of Adelaide on the 26th day of October, 1861, and the most northern station of the colony on the 21st day of January, 1862. To commemorate this happy event., they have raised this flag bearing his name. All well. God save the Queen."
Stuart and the party signed their names to this document. The tree has since been found and recognised, but this memorial has not been discovered.
More fortunate than the other travellers who reached the Gulf shore, Stuart was able to survey the open sea, instead of having to be content with the sight of some mangrove trees and salt water.
Next day Stuart started on his return. His health was failing, and his horses were sadly weakened. After leaving the Newcastle, the water in the many short creeks coming from the range was found to be at the last gasp; in some there was none, in others but a scanty supply. The horses commenced to give in rapidly, and one after another they were left on successive dry stages. Stuart, too, began to think that he would never live to reach the settled districts. Scurvy had brought him down to a terrible state, and after all his success, he scarcely hoped to profit by it. His right hand was nearly useless to him, and after sunset he was blind. He could not stand the pain caused by riding, and a stretcher had to be made to carry him on. Slowly and painfully they crept along until the first station, Mount Margaret, was reached, and here the leader, who was only a skeleton, was able to get a little relief, and finally recovered sufficiently to ride to Adelaide.
This was the last exploration conducted by Stuart. He was rewarded by the Government of the colony he had served so well, and went to reside in England, where he died. He never recovered from the great suffering of his return journey.
At a re-union of returned Australians, held at Glasgow shortly before his death, he had to speak, and it was evident to all that he had quite broken down. He said that "his eyesight and his memory were so far gone that he was unable to compose a speech, or, indeed, to recollect many of the incidents that happened throughout the course of his explorations." This was the sad ending of one of our greatest explorers. Eight full years of his life had been spent in exploring Australia, and neither his means nor resources had ever been great--in fact, on some occasions they had been dangerously small--but he always brought his party back in safety, through every difficulty.
In following up Stuart's last expedition, we have lost sight for a time of the three parties sent out after Burke and Wills, which, although they were unsuccessful in their first aim, yet did sterling service in the field of discovery.
John M'Kinlay started from Adelaide-the scene of so many departures on similar errands--on October 26th, 1861. On arriving at Blanche Water, he was informed that a report was current amongst the natives that some white men and camels had been seen at a distant inland water, but knowing the little reliance to be placed on such statements, he did not at the time pay much attention to it. On the 27th of September, he crossed Lake Torrens--a feat which would have excited great interest a few years ago--and made for Lake Pando, or Lake Hope, as it is better known. From here he went north, crossing the country so often described, wherein Cooper's Creek is lost in many watercourses. He now got more definite details about the whites that he had formerly heard of, and pressed forward to the place indicated by the natives, and on the 18th October, formed a depôt camp for his main party, and started ahead in company with two white men and a native.
Passing through a country full of small shallow lakes, of all of which M'Kinlay has faithfully preserved the terrible native names, such as Lake Moolion--dhurunnie, etc., they came to a watercourse, whereon they found a grave and picked up a battered pint pot. Next morning they opened the grave, and in it was the body of a European, the skull being marked, so M'Kinlay says, with two sabre cuts. He noted down the description of the body, and, from the locality and surroundings, it has been pronounced to have been the body of Gray, who died before reaching Cooper's Creek.
If the reader will remember what was the result of the circumstantial accounts of Leichhardt's murder retailed to Hely by the natives, he will not be astonished at what follows.
The native that M'Kinlay had with him thus described the manner of the white man's death, which, of course, was all pure fiction. First, that the whites were attacked in camp by the natives, who murdered the whole party, finishing up by eating the bodies of the other men. Next, that the journals, saddles, etc., were buried at a fake a short distance away. Naturally, under the circumstances, M'Kinlay believed this story; particularly as further search revealed another grave (empty) and other small evidences of the presence of whites.
Next morning a tribe of blacks appeared, and although they immediately ran away, one was captured, who corroborated the story told by M'Kinlay's native. The prisoner had marks both of ball and shot wounds on him; he stated that there was a pistol concealed near a neighbouring lake, and he was sent to fetch it; but instead, he appeared the following morning at the head of a host of others, well armed, and bent on mischief. The leader was obliged to order his men to fire on them, and it was only after several discharges that they ran away.
M'Kinlay was now quite satisfied that he had found all that remained of the Victorian expedition; and after burying a letter for the information of any after comers, they left Lake Massacre, as he called it, and returned to his depôt camp. The letter hidden was as follows:--
"S.A.B.R. Expedition,"October 23rd, 1861.
"To the leader of any expedition seeking tidings of Burke and party:--
"Sir,--I reached this water on the 19th instant, and by means of a native guide discovered a European camp, one mile north on west side of flat. At, or near this camp, traces of horses, camels, and whites were found. Hair, apparently belonging to Mr. Wills, Charles Gray, Yr. Burke, or King, was picked from the surface of a grave dug by a spade, and from the skull of a European buried by the natives. Other less important traces-such as a pannikin, oil can, saddle stuffing, &c., have been found. Beware of the natives, on whom we have had to fire. We do not intend to return to Adelaide, but proceed to west of north. From information, all Burke's party were killed and eaten.
"JNO. M'KINLAY.
"[P.S.--All the party in good health.]
"If you had any difficulty in reaching this spot, and wish to return to Adelaide by a more practicable route, you may do so for at least three months to come, by driving west eighteen miles, then south of west, cutting our dray track within thirty miles. Abundance of water and feed at easy stages."
M'Kinlay next sent Mr. Hodgkinson with men and packhorses to Blanche Water, to take down the news of his discovery, and to bring back rations for a prolonged exploration. Meantime he remained in camp. From one old native, with whom he had a long conversation, he obtained another version of the supposed massacre, which evidently had a certain admixture of truth.
This was to the effect that the whites repulsed an attack of the natives on their return journey; that in the affair, one white man was killed; he was buried after the fight, and the others went south. The natives then dug up the body and ate the flesh. The blackfellow then described minutely the different waters passed by Burke, and the way the men lived on the seeds of the nardoo plant, which he must have heard of from other natives.
After waiting a little over a month, Mr. Hodgkinson returned, and brought back with him the news of Howitt's success in finding King. This explained M'Kinlay's discovery as being that of Gray's body, the adjuncts of the fight turning out to be exaggerations of the natives. He made an excursion to the eastward, and visited the graves of the two men buried by Howitt, on Cooper's Creek, then he started for the north.
The perusal of his journal, containing the account of his first few weeks' travel, is hard work to accomplish. The native names of every small lake and waterhole are all given in full, and as the course of each day's travel is omitted, it becomes rather difficult to follow the track of the expedition, excepting on the map.
A fairly northerly course was, however, maintained, and M'Kinlay speaks highly of the country for pastoral purposes. As it was the dry time of the year, immediately preceding the setting in of the rains, it shows what a severe season must have been encountered by Sturt when on his last struggle north, as that explorer finally turned his-back in much the same locality.
On the 27th of February, heavy rains set in, fortunately, they were in the neighbourhood of some stony ridges and sand hills, on which they camped, and where they had plenty of space to feed their animals, although surrounded by water.
On March 10th, they started again, and steadily continued north through good travelling country, keeping back from the main creek, which was now too flooded and boggy to follow. This large creek, which was called by M'Kinlay the Mueller, is one of the main rivers of the interior, now known as the Diamantina. M'Kinlay soon kept more to the westward and crossed the stony range, which bears his name, in much the same place that Burke and Wills did. He christened many of the large tributaries of the inland watershed, but most of his names have been replaced by others, it having been difficult to determine them, as in many cases, the creeks he named were but anabranches.
The history of their progress is now monotonous in the extreme, the country through which they travelled presented no great obstacle to the travellers' advance, being well-grassed and watered; and finally on the 6th May they reached the Leichhardt River.
M'Kinlay was most anxious to get to the mouth of the Albert, it being understood that Captain Norman with the steamer Victoria, would there form a depôt for the use of the other explorers, Landsborough and Walker, and M'Kinlay's stock of rations was getting perilously low.
His attempts to reach the sea were, however, fruitless. He was continually turned back by deep and broad mangrove creeks and boggy flats, and on the 21st May the party started for the nearest settled districts in Queensland, in the direction of Port Denison.
They were now on the country already twice described by both Leichhardt and Gregory, and making in the same direction that Gregory did on his return journey. Like him, too, M'Kinlay missed following up the Flinders. He crossed on to the head of the head of the Burdekin, which river he followed down, continually trusting to meet the advancing flocks and herds of the settlers, then pushing forward into the new country. On reaching Mount M'Connell, where the tracks of the two former explorers came respectively to the river, and left it, M'Kinlay kept down the river, crossing the formidable Leichhardt Range, through which the Burdekin forces its way to the lower lands of the coast. Here they came to a temporary station, just formed by Mr. Phillip Somer, where they were received with the usual hearty hospitality. Since leaving the Gulf country the explorers had subsisted on little else than horse and camel flesh, and were necessarily in rather a weak condition; but whilst they were toiling down the channel of the Upper Burdekin, suffering semi-starvation, they were actually travelling amongst the advance-guard of the pioneer squatters, and had they but thought of resting a day and looking around, their wants would have been relieved long before they sighted the gorge of the Burdekin, and their toilsome journey through that gorge have been prevented.
The tracks of the camels had been seen by one squatter [Note, below] at least within a few hours after the cavalcade had passed down the river, and a very little trouble would have saved M'Kinlay much suffering.
[Note: Mr. E. Cunningham, who had then just formed Burdekin Downs Station. He tells, with much amusement, how the nature of the tracks puzzled himself and his black boy. The Burdekin pioneers of course did not expect M'Kinlay's advent amongst them, although they knew he was out west, and such an animal as a camel did not enter into their reckoning. Cunningham says that the only thing he could think of was, that it was a return party who had been looking for new country, and that, having footsore horses and no shoes left, they had wrapped up their horses' feet with bandages.]
M'Kinlay's trip across the continent did good service at this juncture. His track was across the country that had always been considered a terrible desert, useless for pastoral occupation. His report being of such a favourable nature, dealt a final blow to this theory, which Stuart had partly demolished. Fortunately, M'Kinlay was an experienced man, whose verdict was accepted without cavil.
The successful way in which he conducted his party across the continent, and his well-known merits, led to his afterwards being selected by the South Australian Government for a responsible post in the Northern Territory, which will be dealt with in its proper order.
On the 14th of August, 1861, the Firefly, having on board the Brisbane search party for Burke and Wills, left Brisbane. The leader of the party was Mr. William Landsborough, an experienced bushman, having already a good knowledge of new country gained in private exploration. The brig was convoyed by the Victoria, under Captain Norman, who had charge of the expedition until the party were landed. On the way up, the vessels were separated, and the Firefly suffered shipwreck on one of Sir Charles Hardy's islands; the horses being got ashore safely. On the Victoria coming up, the Firefly was repaired sufficiently to serve as a transport. hulk and the party re-embarked; she was taken in tow by the Victoria, and safely reached her destination at the mouth of the Albert River, in the Gulf of Carpentaria.
The Victoria, as arranged, remained there to render assistance to Landsborough on his return, and to the Rockhampton search party under Mr. Walker, on his arrival overland. Landsborough's track, after leaving the Albert, took him on to the banks of a new river, which had the same outlet as the Albert, but on account of the other explorers crossing below the junction, had been hitherto unnoticed. This river, which is a constantly running stream, and flows through well-grassed, level country, was named by him the Gregory. His written opinion of the much-disputed qualities of this district is most sanguine, with regard to its future as a sheep country. Experience, however, has proved otherwise, it being found to be fitted only for cattle. Higher up, Landsborough found the river drier, and presenting a far less tropical appearance than on its lower course. After continued efforts to the south, and the discovery of many tributary creeks, Landsborough, on the 21St of December, found the river which he named the Herbert, one of the most important streams running south, and joining Eyre's Creek. This river has since been re-named by the Queensland Government, in consequence of there being another Herbert River in the territory. With most questionable taste, the officials, out of a wide choice of names, could find none better than the absurd, and inappropriate one of the Georgina! by which it is now known.
The first important feature in Landsborough's Herbert, which runs through richly-grassed tableland country, was met with on the day following its discovery, when a fine sheet of water was found which they named Lake Mary; below this, some distance, was another pool--Lake Frances. Landsborough now made an attempt to push to the westward, but failed through want of water, He then returned up the Herbert, and crossed on to the head of the O'Shanassy, a tributary of the Gregory. Down this river, and by way of Beames' Brook, they returned to the depôt on the Albert, where they arrived on the 8th February, 1862, having been absent nearly three months.
Here Landsborough learnt that during his absence Walker had arrived, and reported finding the tracks of Burke and Wills on the Flinders. He therefore determined to go home in that direction, instead of returning in the steamer, being anxious to see if he could render any assistance. The party was reduced in number to three whites and three blacks in all, namely, Messrs. Landsborough, Bourne, and Gleeson, and the three boys--Jacky, Jemmy, and Fisherman They had a decidedly insufficient stock of rations when they started the second time, being without tea and sugar, the Victoria not being able to supply them with any.
From the Albert depôt Landsborough made for the Flinders, by way of the Leichhardt, and arrived at that river on the 19th February. He followed it up, and was rewarded by being the first discoverer of the beautiful downs country through which it runs. He named the isolated and remarkable hills visible from the river Fort Bowen and Mounts Brown and Little. On the upper part of the Flinders he named Walker's Creek--a considerable tributary--and from there struck more to the south, towards Bowen Downs country discovered by himself and Buchanan two years previously. Here the leader was in hopes of finding a newly-formed station, and obtaining some more supplies; but the country was still untenanted, although in one place they observed the track of a dray, and they also saw the tracks of a party of horsemen near Aramac Creek. They now made for the Thomson, which is formed by the junction of the Landsborough and Cornish Creeks, but did not follow it down to the Barcoo, striking that river higher up. On the Barcoo they had a slight skirmish with the blacks, who nearly surprised them during the night.
Landsborough was now back in well-known country; some of it, in fact, he had been over before himself, and from the number of trees they saw marked with different initials, it was evident that before long stock would be on its way out. He crossed on to the Warrego, followed that river down, and on the 21st of May came to the station of Messrs. Neilson and Williams, where they heard of the fate of Burke and Wills, the objects of their search. From here the party proceeded to the Darling, and finally to Melbourne.
On Landsborough's arrival in Melbourne, he found that rumour had accredited him with being more interested in looking for available pastoral country than in hunting for Burke and Wills. So far as can be seen, this accusation was utterly groundless, as there was no saying to what part of the Gulf Burke and Wills would penetrate, and he was as likely to meet with traces of them on the Barcoo as well as anywhere else. With the general belief then current, of the desert nature of the interior, nobody dreamt that four inexperienced men would have been able to cross so easily in such a straight line.
The charge lay in a newspaper paragraph that went the round of the daily papers, an extract from which runs as follows:--
"Great credit must be given to Mr. Landsborough for the celerity with which he has accomplished the expedition. At the same time, its object seems to have been lost sight of at a very early stage of the journey, as there was not the remotest probability of striking Burke's track after quitting the Flinder's River, and taking a S.S.E. course for the remainder of the way. In fact, from that moment all mention [This is incorrect. Landsborough particularly mentions in his journal during his trip to the Barcoo, how anxiously he endeavoured to find out from the natives if they had seen anybody with camels.] ceases to be made of the ostensible purpose for which the party was organised, until Mr. Landsborough reached the Warrego, and received the intelligence of Burke and Wills having perished, at which great surprise was expressed. But supposing these gallant men to have been still living, and anxiously awaiting succour at some one of the ninety camping places at which they halted, on their arduous journey between the depôt and the Gulf what excuse could Mr. Landsborough have offered for giving so wide a berth to the probable route of the explorers, and for omitting to endeavour to strike their track, traces of which had been reported on the Flinders by Mr Walker? We may be reminded that 'all's well that ends well,' that the lamented explorers were beyond the reach of human assistance, and that Mr. Landsborough has achieved a most valuable result in following the course he did; but we cannot help remarking that in so doing he seems to have been more intent upon serving the cause of pastoral settlement than upon ascertaining if it were possible to afford relief to the missing men. The impression produced by a perusal of the dispatch which we published on Saturday last is that the writer was commissioned to open up a practicable route from the Warrego to the Flinders, and not that he was the leader of a party which had been organized and dispatched 'for the purpose of rendering relief, if possible, to the missing explorers under the command of Mr. Burke.' We do not wish to detract one iota from the credit due to Mr. Landsborough for what he has actually effected, but we must not lose sight of 'the mission of humanity' in which he was professedly engaged, nor the fact that this mission was replaced by one of a totally different character, strengthening, as this circumstance does, the conviction, which is gaining ground in the public mind, that we have been deluded in expending large sums of money in sending out relief expeditions which were chiefly employed in exploring available country for the benefit of the Government and people of Queensland. The cost and the empty honour has been ours, but theirs has been the substantial gain."
The reply to this is very simple. In the first place, Howitt had been sent especially to follow up Burke from the start, and would therefore be supposed to be searching the country on the direct course. Again, Walker was--as Landsborough thought--then following the homeward track of the lost party. The only chance of affording succour to the missing men, left to Landsborough, was the remote one of accidentally coming upon them. Nobody could have reasonably supposed that such a costly and elaborately got up expedition would have degenerated into a scamper across to the Gulf, and a scramble back over the same country.
Apart from all this, Landsborough did not apply for a lease of any of the country discovered by him on the search expedition, the country called Bowen Downs having been his discovery of two years previously, and considering that he closed his days in comparative poverty, after all his labour, such insinuations as the above are most unjust, and would be hardly worthy of comment save for the prominent and adverse notice taken of it by William Howitt, in general such an impartial historian.
The late William Landsborough first went north to Queensland in 1853. In 1854 Messrs. Landsborough and Ranken formed a station on the Kolan River, between Gayndah and Gladstone, where between bad seasons and blacks they had considerable trouble. In 1856 his exploring career commenced in the district of Broadsound and the Isaacs River. In 1858 he explored the Comet to the watershed, and in the following year the head-waters of the Thomson.
An old friend and comrade, writing of him, says:--
"Landsborough's enterprise was entirely founded on his own self-reliance. He had neither Government aid nor capitalists at his back when he achieved his success as an explorer. He was the very model of a pioneer--courageous, hardy, good-humoured, and kindly. He was an excellent horseman, a most entertaining and, at times, eccentric companion, and he could starve with greater cheerfulness than any man I ever saw or heard of. But excellent fellow though he was, his very independence of character and success in exploring provoked much ill-will."
It is to be hoped, therefore, that in future Landsborough's great services will be regarded in a more just light than they were by some of his contemporaries, particularly some living explorers, who resemble the one alluded to by Dr. Lang:--
"But Mr. ---- is not the only geographical explorer in Australia who, 'Turk-like, could bear no brother near the throne.' It seems to be a family failing."
Frederick Walker was the leader of the Rockhampton search expedition. He was an old bushman, had had much to do with the formation of the native police of Queensland, and took a party of native troopers with him on this occasion.
On receiving his commission he pushed rapidly out to the Barcoo, and in the neighbourhood of the tree marked L, found by Gregory, discovered another L tree. This may or may not be considered a corroboration that the first was Leichhardt's, there being arguments on both sides. From the Barcoo he struck north-west to the Alice, seeing some old horse-tracks, which he thought must be Leichhardt's, but which were probably those of Landsborough and Buchanan. From the head-waters of the Alice and Thomson, Walker struck a river he called the Barkly, in reality the head of the Flinders. Here he experienced much difficulty from the rough basaltic nature of the country which borders the upper reaches of this river. Finally getting on to the great western plains he unwittingly crossed the Flinders, and went far to the north looking for it. Bearing into the Gulf, he had several encounters with the natives, who by this time it may be supposed began to see too many exploring parties.
Walker's track down here is rather vague. He may be said to have run a parallel course to the Flinders River away to the north of it, until, on nearing the coast, the bend of the river brought it across his course again. Here he found the tracks of the camels, which assured him that Burke had at any rate reached the Gulf in safety. He therefore pushed on to the depôt at the Albert to get a supply of provisions, and return and follow the tracks up.
He reached the Victoria depôt safely, as before related, and reported his discovery, having had two more skirmishes with the natives on the way. Fresh provisioned, he made back for the Flinders, but found it impossible to follow the tracks. From what he saw, however, he formed a theory that Burke had retreated towards Queensland, and there he made up his mind to return. He regained his former course on the river he calls the Norman, but which may have been the Saxby, and up this river he toiled till he reached the network of watersheds which forms such a jumble of broken country at the heads of the Burdekin, Lynd, Gilbert and Flinders.
Here Walker's horses suffered severely from the rocks and stones, until at last, by the time they had reached the Lower Burdekin, they were well-nigh horseless, and quite starving. On the 4th of April, 1862, they reached Strathalbyn cattle station, owned by Messrs. Wood and Robison, not far from where M'Kinlay eventually arrived.
M'Kinlay's was the last party to use the roundabout and rugged road to the head of the Burdekin that seemed to have such attractions for all the explorers. Henceforth the road to the Gulf lay down the wide plains of the Flinders.
Walker was afterwards employed by the Queensland Government to explore a track for the telegraph line from Rockingham Bay to the mouth of the Norman River, in the Gulf of Carpentaria. This he carried out successfully; but when at the Gulf he was attacked by the then prevalent malarial fever, and died there.
This completes the series of expeditions undertaken for the relief of Burke and Wills. The eastern half of Australia was now nearly all known--from south to north, and from north to south, it had been crossed and re-crossed, and future enterprise was soon to expend itself upon the western half.
So far the results arrived at had been most satisfactory. Not much over forty years after Oxley's gloomy prediction of the future of the interior, country had been found surpassing in richness any that was then known. The pathways for the pioneers had been marked out, and a few more years was to see the whole of the continent up to the western boundary of Queensland the busy scene of pastoral industry.
Most noticeable in the history we have just recounted is the persistent manner in which each succeeding explorer found in all new discoveries the fulfillment of some pet theory. To the men brought up in the old school of belief in the central desert, every fresh advance into the interior was only pushing the desert back a step; it was there still, and, according to some, it is there now. Others who believed in the great river theory, imagined its source in the fresh discovery of every inland river; and those who pinned their faith on a central range, accepted the low broken ridges of the M'Donnel Ranges as the leading spurs.
But the discoveries of the luxuriant new herbage and edible shrubs of the interior were the greatest stumbling block to all. That the much-despised salsolea and other shrubs should be coveted and sought after; that the bugbear of Oxley, the acacia pendula, should now be held to indicate good country was inconceivable; and when, above everything, the most fondly cherished of all delusions, that in the torrid north the sheep's wool would turn to hair, had to be given up, it was quite evident that a new order of belief would soon be entertained.
Writers, however, were still found to argue that things must be after the old opinion. When M'Kinlay took his little flock of sheep across Australia and found them grow so fat that, when at the Gulf, he had to select the leanest one to kill from choice, they cried out triumphantly, "Ah, but the flesh was tasteless!" When he assured them that he had never enjoyed better mutton, they said that it was hunger made him think so.
Still the distinctive value of the country was not under stood. Landsborough, who ought certainly to have known better, speaks highly of the Gulf plains as a suitable sheep run; but he was not alone in this belief. The valley of the Burdekin, and many of its tributaries were stocked with sheep by men of acknowledged experience. In a few years the error was found out, and sheep pastures were sought for only in the uplands of the interior.
But the later explorations had done much good for the new colony of Queensland. Most of the work, with the exception of Stuart's, had been wrought out within her boundaries, and capital and stock flowed in from all sides. This led to many private expeditions, such as those conducted formerly by Messrs. Landsborough, Walker, and Buchanan.
Amongst these, one under the leadership of Mr. Dalrymple penetrated the coast country north of Rockhampton, and discovered the main tributaries of the Lower Burdekin, the Bowen and the Bogie rivers. They followed down the Burdekin in 1859, and discovered that its embouchere was much higher up the coast than was supposed. From this point they turned back, and ascending the coast range, reached the upper waters of the Burdekin, and discovered the Valley of Lagoons, west of Rockingham Bay. Another party, consisting of Messrs. Cunningham, Somer, Stenhouse, Allingham, and Miles explored the Upper Burdekin in the following year, and discovered tracts of good pastoral country on the many tributaries of that river. The remarkable running stream which joins the Burdekin below the township of Dalrymple, and was noticed and called by M'Kinlay the Brown River, was really first found by this party, though where it obtained its present name of Fletcher's Creek is not on record.
In the far south, the Great Bight became once more the scene of interest. In 1862, Goyder paid a visit to the much-abused region north of Fowler's Bay, but found nothing to reward him but mallee scrub and spinifex. In this year Delisser and Hardwicke went over the same country, but on a much more attractive route, as they came upon a large, limitless plain, covered with grass and saltbush. Unfortunately they could find no water, but since then this want has been supplied by sinking and boring, and pastoral settlement has extended so far.
In the year 1863, Mr. Thomas Macfarlane attempted to get inland, north of the Bight, but was forced to turn back, after suffering much hardship. He, too, found some fairly-grassed country, but quite waterless.
In Western Australia, the colonists still made efforts to find good country east of the Swan River. Lefroy and party pushed out to the eastward of York, but were not able to give a much better account of the country than their predecessors. In the north-west a party of colonists landed at the De Grey River, and settled on the country found by F. Gregory. Their account quite confirmed the one given by that explorer previously.
Once more a fresh chapter in the history of exploration has to be turned. All around the coast the fringe of settlement was rapidly creeping, the gaps of unoccupied country growing smaller and fewer every year. The adventurous traveller who now forced his way through to the late uninhabited north coast would find several infant settlements ready to receive him, and he would no longer be obliged to retrace, with weakened frame and exhausted resources, his toilsome outward track. The last stage of Australia's history was about to set in; the telegraph wire was soon to follow on Stuart's footsteps, and the ring of communication to be nearly completed around the continent.