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At some native wells, called by them Waterloo Wells, they had an enforced spell of more than a month, and in addition lost three camels, and one of the Afghans nearly died of scurvy. Afterwards they soon got fairly into the salt-lake country, and on the 12th August, at the end of a long and exhausting march, were relieved by one of the small native wells, on which the blacks of this region exist.
From the North they are not visible a greater distance than three miles, while from the East one can see them a distance of eight miles. I altered our course, therefore, towards the hills, and we shortly crossed the narrow arm of a salt-lake; on the far side several tracks of emus and natives caught my eye, and I sent Charlie on Satan to scout.
On the 15th of June we found a hollow in which were two or three small salt-lake beds, but these were perfectly dry; on the 16th also another solitary one was seen, and here a few low rises lay across a part of the eastern horizon. On the 17th a little water left in the bottom of a bucket overnight was frozen into a thick cake in the morning, the thermometer indicating 18 degrees.
Dempster, Clarkson, and Harper started from Northam to make one more trial to the east to get through the dense scrubs and the salt-lake country into a more promising region. It was purely a private expedition; one of those that have done so much of the work of discovery in Australia; each member of the party found his own horses and equipment.
The thickness of the beds in each salt deposit of course depends entirely upon the area of the original sea or salt-lake, and the length of time during which the evaporation went on. Sometimes we may get a mere film of salt; sometimes a solid bed six hundred feet thick. Perfectly pure rock-salt is colourless and transparent; but one doesn't often find it pure.
After landing, we had a very rough walk over a rugged field of recent lava, which has almost surrounded a tuff-crater, at the bottom of which the salt-lake lies. The water is only three or four inches deep, and rests on a layer of beautifully crystallized, white salt.
My plan was first to revisit some known good country to the south of Hannan's, and, if unsuccessful, to travel from that point in a more or less north-north-west direction, and so follow, instead of crossing, the trend of the various formations; for in travelling from east to west, or VICE VERSA, one crosses a succession of parallel belts, first a sand-plain, then a ridge of granite, next a timbered flat, then a stretch of auriferous country, with possibly a belt of flat salt-lake country on either side.
Oh, just is the Wheel! He blessed them in detail the great glaciers, the naked rocks, the piled moraines and tumbled shale; dry upland, hidden salt-lake, age-old timber and fruitful water-shot valley one after the other, as a dying man blesses his folk; and Kim marvelled at his passion. 'Yes yes. There is no place like our Hills, said the people of Shamlegh.
Eventually I decided to go on a few miles more to the west, in order to see whether the character of the country was in any way altered before I returned to the depot. We went about forty miles beyond the dam; the only alteration in the country consisted of a return to the salt-lake system that had ceased for so many miles prior to our reaching our little dam.
Colony at Charles Island. James Island. Salt-lake in crater. Natural history of the group. Ornithology, curious finches. Reptiles. Great tortoises, habits of. Marine Lizard, feeds on Sea-weed. Terrestrial Lizard, burrowing habits, herbivorous. Importance of reptiles in the Archipelago. Fish, shells, insects. Botany. American type of organisation.
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