RETURN OF CAPT. STURT FROM THE EXPEDITION INTO THE NORTHERN INTERIOR. [From the Southern Australian, Jan. 16.]

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume II, Issue 75, 14 March 1846, Page 4

RETURN OF CAPT. STURT FROM THE EXPEDITION INTO THE NORTHERN INTERIOR. [From the Southern Australian, Jan. 16.]

We have very great pleasure in reporting that Captain Sturt has returned from his perilous expedition, and that he will arrive at Moorunde to-morrow. Dr. Brown has preceded him a few days, and has brought despatches to the Governor, and letters to the Captain's lady, relations, and friends. Having been kindly favoured by John Morphett, Esq., with a copy of a long letter received by him, we subjoin extracts, which form a tolerably minute narrative of the gallant explorer's proceedings and sufferings. The letter from Captain Sturt is dated 21st December last. On the preceding day he had reached the Darling, after a most perilous journey from the depot, a distance of 270 miles. He effected his retreat with great difficulty, the first water being 150 miles from the depot. He was absolutely forced to make the attempt, for the only other alternative was to remain and " rot at the old post." The heat was perfectly horrible ; and had they not been providentially visited with a change of wind, and a shower of rain, which cooled the air and ground, they would have perished. They did not, as it turned out, lose even a sheep. After this account of the retreat, Captain Sturt proceeds to detail the transactions from the time when he was last heard of. It may be remembered that it was his intention to proceed to the north-west, in the hope of finding an inland sea. He says, " I went from the old depot to Lake Torrens, hoping to find a country affording a practicable route to the north, but was disappointed. I returned to the depot to make a more extensive excursion to the north-west. On the 14th August, I left the camp wich Mr. Brown and three men, taking fifteen weeks' provisions, but after penetrating to latitude 24*39, and longitude 138', I was obliged to return from the failure both of water and grass. Dr. Brown also suffered greatly from scurvy, but was too high-minded to complain. He is indeed an inestimable young man, and has been as a brother to me. We passed over a country of alternate sandhills and fla(%. until I struck upon a creek, beyond which fne country was more open and more subject to floods ; we crossed over extensive plains, subject to deep inundations, but soon again got on sandhills. From them we descended to a stony plain of boundless extent, on which the horses left no track, and where no object was visible on the horizon from which to take bearings. Crossing these, wjgr descended to fiats, like a ploughed fi<^£ on which water had subsided, .stratehing W the north-east and south?weif, farther than the range of vision, and without a blade of vegetation. From this we again ascended^StfiL- ridges, of the most formidable descrj^^^Esnd found the countryVo'tne west soffiflflWpere we attempted to penetrate in that direction, and surface water so scarce, that we were obliged to turn to the north at 50 miles, with only two small puddles to depend on. I struck a creek which I traced up 60 miles, when I got on a country of salt formation, covered with sapphire and other salsolaceous productions, with numbers of dry beds of lagoons, all white as snow with salt. Passing this we once more found ourselves among sand ridges, perfectly insurmountable, so close that the base of one touched the base of another — the whole country sand. The sandhills were of a fiery red, and they ran for miles and miles, in parallel rows, with points like the vanishing points of an avenue. But there was neither grass nor water to be found, and after trying all points of the compass, I gave it up and returned to the depot, after an absence of seven weeks, and a ride of 924 miles. The men were all knocked up, and the horses perfectly leg weary : but I was dissatisfied with this journey, and there was little time for hesitation. Therefore, afteij giving the animals six days rest, I again left! the camp, with Mr. Stewart, leaving Mr.' Brown in charge of the camp, whose readiness to do anything I wished, lightened my labours. I took two men, and nine weeks provisions, my object being to try to enter the tropic, to ascertain if there was any water between me and the north coast, or if the desert extends to the very tropics. I went due north, and struck a most splendid creek at 123 miles from the depot. Here I had a thunder-storm that lasted half an hour, and left some surface water, dependent on which I crossed it, and ran out 170 miles without finding a single channel for conveyance of water. I dug five wells, but had little hope of benefitting from them. I was at length brought up by a stony desert that stretched before us in absolute boundlessness, where there were sandhills in it before,' the sandhills were now covered with stone,

similar to (lie plain itt elf. I was then in the centre of & dark and adamantine sea, without an object to steer my course. I was 41 miles advanced in this gloomy region, and 52 from water. My horses had already been one day without water, and I could not hope to reach the other water under a day and a half, including part of the night : yet I hesitated to turn back. It was an irresistible influence that forced me back, certainly contrary to my own inclinations. I was well nigh too late. I lost three horses, but that was of no consequence on such an occasion. I got back to the creek, after having reached latitude 25*45, and longitude 139*13. From the creek on which I was, I had seen high and broken ranges to the north-east, and I now determined on examining them add the creek. I therefore went up to the latter, 120 miles, but I found that it was leading me away from the ranges, and 1 ultimately got to its termination, or rather head, in some extensive plains. The creek was as large as the Darling, and was flanked by a box-tree forest, in grassy land, to a considerable distance from its banks. Here I fell in with a numerous population, passing three or four small tribes every day ; but the news of our kind treatment of them had spread through the country, and they evinced no alarm, but did all they could to serve us. On the 3rd October, I was at the head of the creek, and all at once found myself in presence of about 270 or 280 natives, encamped on a rising piece of ground, under a large sandhill I had descended. On seeing us they set up a great shout, but when I rode slowly down the hill there was a dead silence ; then I dismounted, and giving my horse to one of the men, walked over to the natives, who received me very kindly, brought me troughs of water, and baked seed, and invited me to sleep at one of their fires, but observing a small clump of trees about fifty yards away from the native camp, I told them that I would sleep there, to which they gave a ready assent, and carried over firewood for our use, which was very scarce. These people were the finest I have seen in Australia. Many stood six, several more than six feet high. They were well made, and had not the pot bellies of the natives in general. They were a frank and merry people, and told me all they could. They assured me there was no water to the east or north, and were quite distressed when I persisted next day in going to the eastward. The women were engaged i^ a late hour in bruising seed for cakes, and the noise they made was like the working of looms in a manufacturing town. At ten all was hushed, and for the remainder of the night no one would have known that there warn so manj: human beings near. From this point I turned westward, and taking up a branch-creek, went towards the ranges ; but I got into a terrible country, and found that the effects of refraction had deceived me with regard to the ranges, and that they were nothing but masses of sand and rocks, three to five hundred feet high. I saw that I was getting near the scene of the greatest turmoil, where the mass of water passed over this dreary waste, and left the shivered fragments of mountains behind it. Here, again, water and grass failed me, and I was forced to abandon this trying task on the 9th November, being unable to contend against the season and country. I had done all I could do, and had again run the risk of being altogether cutoff; indeed so near was it, that I drained the last drop of mvd — for it was not water — out of a pool that, four weeks before, was 150 yards broad, and 200 to 300 long. I lost two horses, and regretted them very much. I reached the depot (which Mr. Brown Had been obliged to move during my absence, in consequence of the putridity of the water) on the 17th, having ridden eight hundred and forty-three miles in five weeks, less three days. I had been exposed for twelve weeks to an excessive heat, had had insufficient food, had drunk loathsome water, and at length my iron constitution, under disappointment, anxiety, and weakness, gave way. The day I made the camp I was eighteen hours on horseback ; and when I dismounted, the spasmodic action of the muscles of my thigh was so violent as to throw me forward. I had in truth ridden all day in great pain. The next day the scurvy, latent in me for eleven months, seised me. The muscles of my thighs contracted, and I was laid prostrate on my mattrass. lam still unable to walk or stand, but I am otherwise well in health, and I hope with. all the good things my friends have sent me, I shall get round. Thus, then, has terminated our expedition— the labour and anxiety of which have been excessive, but the results unsatisfactory.