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Updated: June 11, 2025
Before leaving I purchased a microscope which was for sale, and presented it to the doctor of the expedition with sincere thanks for saving my life. During the time I was in Burketown, Mr. Sharkey, Lands Commissioner, came over from Sweers Island, and offered to submit my name for the Commission of Peace, and said Mr. Landsborough, the Police Magistrate, would swear me in. I declined the honour.
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.
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 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.
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 depot on the Albert, where they arrived on the 8th February, 1862, having been absent nearly three months.
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.
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 depot Landsborough made for the Flinders, by way of the Leichhardt, and arrived at that river on the 19th February.
In crossing the divide between the Landsborough and Diamantina waters, we rode over virgin country which was infested with bush rats, and numbers of tiger snakes gorged after eating them. In one place, which was 25 miles from water, the snakes were so numerous that we had a difficulty in getting our pack horses safely through them. Yet it is argued that snakes are never very far from water.
Queensland sent Landsborough by sea to Carpentaria, where he was landed and left to live or die as he might, though of course he had a proper equipment of horses, men, and gear. He followed up the Flinders River of Stokes, had a fine country to traverse; got on to the head of the Warrego, and finally on to the Darling River in New South Wales. He came across no traces whatever of Burke.
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.
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