This number should have appeared as one of the first of the series, being the interesting narrative of the first overland expedition with cattle from Sydney to this colony. That expedition was one of the early and essential instruments in the successful conversion of a vast wilderness into a fruitful garden, and in assisting in the establishment of a colony now one of the brightest jewels in the British Crown. I am entirely indebted to Mr. Charles Bonney for the account which follows, and feel especially obliged to him, knowing how fully his time is occupied by his important official duties : —

" The first expedition was fitted out by Joseph Hawden, Esq. The cattle were mustered on the Goulburn just below the crossing-place of the Sydney-road. A start was made on the 26th January, 1838. I had joined the party a day or two previously, and had undertaken the duty of choosing the line of route in leading the drays, the cattle being generally some little distance in the rear. The course we had intended to take was to follow the Goulburn to the point where Mitchell supposed he had left it when he turned to the south-ward after exploring the River Darling, and then to take his track to the southward, to follow the course of some of the rivers which he had crossed and which he described as flowing to the westward, hoping that we might thereby avoid what was an-ticipated to be a difficult country to get through with cattle in the neighborhood of the Murray Cliffs, described by Captain Sturt.

" We found as we followed the course of the Goulburn, instead of its running in the direction of Mitchell's supposed point of departure from its banks, a little north of west, it trended more and more to the north, and sometimes east of north, until we suddenly came upon the junction of a large river coming from the eastward. Knowing that we were somewhere about 100 miles to the eastward of what Mitchell had described as the junction of the Goulbourn with the Murray, and yet feeling certain that the river before us could be none other than the Murray, we were very much puzzled at first to reconcile Mitchell's account with what we saw.

" However, at last we hit upon the solution of the difficulty, which afterwards we proved to be correct, that he had mistaken a channel of the Murray for the junction of another river, and we pursued our course along the left bank of the Murray until we came to Mitchell's track. We then followed the course he took to the southward, passing the hill he named Mount Hope, because from its summit he saw a line of trees which seemed to mark the course of a large river flowing to the westward. We also had a view from the summit of Mount Hope, but it was Mount Disappointment to us. The line of trees described by Mitchell evidently marked the direction of a water-course flowing to the northward to join the Murray.

" However, we followed Mitchell's track till we came to a log bridge, which he had thrown over the river, seen from Mount Hope, which he named the Garrayne. His grand river had dwindled down to a dry creek, with only a little water left in some of the holes at distant intervals. The question, then was what course should we follow ? Go on to some of the other rivers which Mitchell had described, or return to the River Murray, which we had left, and trust no more to Mitchell's accounts? My advice to go back to the Murray was followed.

" To do this we continued on the course of the Garrayne to its junction with the Murray, and continued to follow down on the left bank of that river until we thought we were below the junction of the Darling with the Murray, when we crossed to the other or north side, but soon found we had crossed a little too early, the junction of the Darling being still below us. However, as we were travelling in a very dry season, and the rivers were all very low, the crossing of the Darling gave no trouble.

" After this we kept the right bank of the River Murray until we had passed the North-West Bend, and made three days journey on its southerly course. We then left the river and crossed over to the ranges, keeping to the foot of them until we saw a likely opening through which to cross the ranges, and passed immediately to the north of Mount Barker, from the top of which we obtained a view of Lake Alexandrina, and being misled by Sturt's description of the position of the junction of the river and the lake we kept to the southward, and after coming on the Onkaparinga River followed its course until we came out at the Horseshoe.

" Here we found a party of kangaroo hunters (Sladden and others) encamped, and from them we learned the direction of the settlement and its distance. We then bore up north and formed our cattle camp near one of the South Australian Company's sheep stations No. 2. We arrived at the settlement on April 4, 1838, in two months from our starting point, although we travelled many miles out of our way. Thus ended the first overland journey from New South Wales to Adelaide with cattle succeeding Captain Sturt's boat expedition down the Murray.

" After we left Mitchell's Garrayne every thing went smoothly ; we had no trouble whatever with the natives. At Swan Hill we established friendly relations with them, and from that point until we left the river they always sent forward messengers to the next tribe, to give notice of our approach, and we used to find the tribe drawn up to meet us, on which occasions they gave vent to their astonishment, in an audible manner, at the sight of what was to them such a strange race.

" On one occasion only were we in danger of coming into collision with them. I had left the drays and proceeded in advance to look out for a road, and the party had come up with a tribe of blacks, drawn up, as usual, at the edge of a lagoon, which the drays had to go round; and the blacks wishing to have another look at the strange white creatures, took a short cut across the lagoon to meet them, when our men became frightened, and took it into their heads that the blacks were going to attack them, and halted the drays and got out their firearms. The blacks, seeing what was going on, handled their spears in self-defence. Fortunately, at this moment I returned, just as the fight was about to commence. I had been a great deal among the blacks, and was well acquainted with their habits. I saw at once the mistake the men had made, and ordered them to put down their guns. I then rode up to the natives, and by signs induced them to lower their spears, and so peace was restored. The natives on many occasions proved very useful to us, and the paths which they had made in travelling up and down the river afforded an unfailing guide as to the direction we ought to take in order to cross the great bends it frequently makes.

" On one occasion we came to a point on its course where the river swept away to the south as far as the eye could reach without any appearance of a return to its general western course. A well-beaten native track led off north of west, and it became a weighty question whether we should trust to the usual guidance of a native path or keep to the river. It was evident that if the path led to the river it would not reach it for many miles, and I was inclined to adopt the safer course of keeping to the river; but Hawden thought we might venture to follow the path, and we did so. We travelled on till late in the afternoon, and still there was no appearance of the river gums in the western horizon. Hawden, who had ridden on ahead, anxious to look out for the river, came hurriedly back, and wanted me to turn to the southward and strike in for the river, but I showed him that it was too late then to alter our course, and that we should probably find the river further away to the south than in the direction we were going.

" We accordingly pursued our course along the native track, and just before dark we were fortunate enough to come upon a fine sheet of water, which Hawden named Lake Bonney. One of the overland parties who came down after us determined to stick to the river, and it took them nearly a week to get round the bend. When we arrived at that part of the river where the cliffs commence my great difficulty was to know when to keep to the river flats and when to take to the high land. On the flats it was much better travelling than on the sandy plains on the top of the cliffs, but the river would sometimes take a sudden sweep round to the cliffs and compel us to climb to the high land, when we might have to go back two or three miles before we could find a place up which the drays could be taken.

" At last we fell in with three natives, who gave us to understand by signs that they belonged to a tribe lower down the river, and that they would accompany us. One of them I adopted as a guide and made him understand what I wanted, and such was his intelligent and quick apprehension that, though he had never seen a white man before, he seemed to know almost by instinct where a dray could pass and where it could not. He acted as my guide for three or four days, and during the whole of that time he never once led us wrong. Old colonists will remember my friend in old 'Tinberry,' whose portrait figured in Eyre's Australia.

" At the time we commenced our overland journey the second expedition was being fitted out under the leadership of Mr. E. J. Eyre. Both my party and his had without concert fixed on the same line of route — that was to follow the course of the rivers which Major Mitchell said he had discovered south of the Murray, and which it was supposed would join and form what Captain Sturt thought to be a river running into the Murray above the Great Bend, but which was subsequently discovered to be merely an anabranch of the river.

" Eyre, however, struck across from Mount Macedon, and cut Mitchell's track a little south of the Yarrayne Bridge, where he arrived about a fortnight after we had been there. He saw our tracks going back towards the Murray, and not having had so much experience of Mitchell's inaccuracies as we had found, he placed accordingly more reliance on his description of the rivers he had met with further south, and in consequence he continued on Mitchell's track, and tried to get to the westward by following the courses of several rivers one after the other, but they all ran out in the scrub until he came upon the Wimmera, which he found to end in a lake, to which he gave the name of Lake Hindmarsh, after the then Governor of South Australia.

" He next tried to push through the scrub to reach the River Murray by a northerly course, but he was foiled in the attempt after destroying many of his horses, and losing some of his men by desertion. He was at length compelled to retrace his steps, and after much suffering he reached Mitchell's Bridge, on the Garrayne, about three months after he first saw that watercourse. Weakened as he was by the loss of horses and the desertion of some of his men, he persevered on his journey, and following on our tracks arrived at the settlement in Adelaide free from further troubles."

Here ends Mr. Bonney's first paper, most kindly furnished to me, which I hope will be followed by accounts of further trips which he so successfully made, especially with that crowning one by the south coast when he opened up the communication between the Portland Bay country with our colony, achieving the task in which Mr. Eyre first failed, and which was subsequently attempted with cattle for the Messrs. Hacks by Captain Hart, who, after considerable exertion and loss of time, was compelled to follow Mr. Eyre's tracks by the Garrayne bridge and down the Murray.

Captain Hart, as he explained to me immediately after his arrival with the cattle, started on a northerly and altered course at a point much nearer the sea coast than Mr. Eyre did. He then worked his course by observations to make Mitchell's Garrayne bridge, and did not cut Eyre's track till his near approach to the log bridge. I must state that Hawden and Bonney brought in their cattle and horses in fine condition, but Mr. Eyre and his party, men and stock, arrived in a weakened state. I had good reason to know this, for I had the charge and sale of the cattle which were purchased from Mr. Eyre on account of a Sydney firm, whose agent I was. Although I was able to place these cattle on splendid feed, it took many months before they recovered from the hardships they had undergone, at the same time I must admit they were cattle of a much inferior description and breed to the fine herd which Mr. Bonney conducted for Mr. Hawden, which, although the first introduced overland, have never been surpassed by any large draft brought from the adjoining colonies.