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Steering to the south-west we came at twelve miles to the head of Spencer's Gulf, and crossed the channel connecting it with Lake Torrens. At this place it is not very wide, but its bed like that of the lake is soft and boggy, with salt water mixed with the mud.

Pellew was bound, in consideration of his company, to dwell upon the desirableness of keeping an even mind. Having done full justice to this side of the subject, he added a rider. He had always said the chances were ten to one Torrens would recover his eyesight, and this sort of thing looked uncommonly like it. Now didn't it?

Without some sort of reasonable guarantee that Mr. Torrens cannot recover his eyesight, I do contend that it would be in the highest degree rash to take an irrevocable step, and to condemn one perhaps both, for I assure you I am thinking of Mr. Torrens's welfare as well as your own to a lifetime of repentance." "Mamma dear, don't be a humbug!

Edward Eyre, subsequently known as Governor Eyre, made an attempt to reach, in 1840-1841, Central Australia by a route north from the city of Adelaide; and as Sturt imagined himself surrounded by a desert, so Eyre thought he was hemmed in by a circular or horse-shoe-shaped salt depression, which he called Lake Torrens; because, wherever he tried to push northwards, north-westwards, eastwards, or north-eastwards, he invariably came upon the shores of one of these objectionable and impassable features.

"I do think we ought to have invited Belle Torrens," fretted Mrs. Gilson. "We've simply got to have her here soon." Mr. Gilson speculated intensely, "But she's the dullest soul on earth, and her husband spends all his spare time in trying to think up ways of doing me dirt in business. Oh, by the way, did you get the water tap in the blue room fixed? It's dripping all the time." "No, I forgot it."

Went to the top of Hermit Hill, whence I obtained a very extensive view of Lake Torrens from north-west to north-east. Mount Hermit is surrounded by low hills, and in the far distance there seems to be rising ground. To the south are broken hills, the termination of the Mount North-west range. I shall examine that part of the country to-morrow.

In the early part of the Expedition, 1840, the continuation of Flinders range, from Mount Arden, was traced and laid down to its termination, near the parallel of 29 degrees S. It was ascertained to be hemmed in by an impassable barrier, consisting of the basin of an immense lake, which I named Lake Torrens, and which, commencing from the head of Spencer's Gulf, increased in width as it swept to the north-west, but subsequently bent round again to the north-east, east and south-east, in correspondence with the trend of Flinders range, the northern extremity of which it completely surrounded in the form of a horse-shoe.

M'Kinlay was sent by South Australia to advance in the direction of Lake Torrens and reach Cooper's Creek. These various expeditions were all eager in prosecuting the search, but it was to Mr. Howitt's party that success fell. In following the course of Cooper's Creek downward from the depôt he saw the tracks of camels, and by these he was led to the district in which Burke and Wills had died.

This dog was not only tolerated but encouraged everywhere. Dogs are, when their eyes are pathetic, their coats faultless, and their compliance with household superstitions unhesitating. "Anybody in sight, Mrs. Bailey?" "Nobody yet, Mr. Torrens." "Speriamo! Perhaps there's a piano in the room, Mrs. Bailey?" "There's two. One's stood up against the wall shut.

Poole; again, I myself had an extensive and distant view to the north-east and east from Mount Hopeless, a low hill, about ninety miles further north than Captain Frome's position, but a little more east; yet there was nothing like a sea to be seen from thence, the dry and glazed-looking bed of Lake Torrens alone interrupting the monotony of the desert.