Expedition into Central Australia | Page 5

Charles Sturt
in a single night, from an almost dry channel, into a foaming
and impetuous stream, rolling along its irresistible and turbid waters, to
add to those of the Murray.
There can be no doubt, but, that this sudden rise in the river, was
caused by heavy rains on the mountains, in which its tributaries are to
be found, for the Darling does not receive any accession to its waters
below their respective junctions, of sufficient magnitude to account for
such an occurrence. [Note 1. below]
[Note 1. The principal tributaries of the Darling, are the Kindur, the
Keraula, the Namoy, and the Gwydir. They are beautiful mountain
streams, and rise in the hilly country, behind Moreton Bay, in lat. 27
degrees, and in longitude 152 degrees E.]
When, on the return of the expedition homewards the following year,
some two months later in the season than that of which I have just been
speaking, Oct. 1844, there had been no recurrence of the flood of the
previous year, but the Darling was at a still lower ebb than before, and
every lagoon, and creek in its vicinity had long been exhausted and
waterless. [Note 2. below] Now, it is evident, as far as I can judge, that
if the rains of Australia were as regular as in other countries, its rivers
would also be more regular in their flow, and would not present the
anomaly they now do, of being in a state of rapid motion at one time,
and motionless at another.
[Note 2. It may be necessary to warn my readers that a creek in the

Australian colonies, is not always an arm of the sea. The same term is
used to designate a watercourse, whether large or small, in which the
winter torrents may or may not have left a chain of ponds. Such a
watercourse could hardly be called a river, since it only flows during
heavy rains, after which it entirely depends on the character of the soil,
through which it runs, whether any water remains in it or not.
A lagoon is a shallow lake, it generally constitutes the back water of
some river, and is speedily dried up. In Australia, there is no surface
water, properly so called, of a permanent description.]
But, although I am making these general observations on the rivers, and
to a certain extent of climate of Australia, I would not be understood to
mean more than that its seasons are uncertain, and that its summers are
of comparatively long duration.
In reference to its rivers also, the Murray is an exception to the other
known rivers of this extensive continent. The basins of that fine stream
are in the deepest recesses of the Australian Alps--which rise to an
elevation of 7000 feet above the sea. The heads of its immediate
tributaries, extend from the 36th to the 32nd parallel of latitude, and
over two degrees of longitude, that is to say, from the 146 degrees to
the 148 degrees meridian, but, independently of these, it receives the
whole westerly drainage of the interior, from the Darling downwards.
Supplied by the melting snows from the remote and cloud-capped chain
in which its tributaries rise, the Murray supports a rapid current to the
sea. Taking its windings into account, its length cannot be less than
from 1300 to 1500 miles. Thus, then, this noble stream preserves its
character throughout its whole line. Uninfluenced by the sudden floods
to which the other rivers of which we have been speaking are subject,
its rise and fall are equally gradual. Instead of stopping short in its
course as they do, its never-failing fountains have given it strength to
cleave a channel through the desert interior, and so it happened, that,
instead of finding it terminate in a stagnant marsh, or gradually
exhausting itself over extensive plains as the more northern streams do,
I was successfully borne on its broad and transparent waters, during the
progress of a former expedition, to the centre of the land in which I
have since erected my dwelling.
As I have had occasion to remark, the rise and fall of the Murray are
both gradual. It receives the first addition to its waters from the

eastward, in the month of July, and rises at the rate of an inch a day
until December, in which month it attains a height of about seventeen
feet above its lowest or winter level. As it rises it fills in succession all
its lateral creeks and lagoons, and it ultimately lays many of its flats
under water.
The natives look to this periodical overflow of their river, with as much
anxiety as did ever or now do the Egyptians, to the overflowing of the
Nile. To both they are the bountiful dispensation of a
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