cause that was the first mail we sent out after the Newcastle Bay camp and there was a fairly long delay between letters anyway, since we could not send anything out while we were at Newcastle Bay. By my book, I find that I sent more mail out on the woth but of course cannot tell just how many lots of let- ters Stan held up. At least we should not have that trouble here and I expect incoming mail on Wednesday and shall sand some out on Thursday. Tuesday, 8 June 1943. Again just another day of collecting and they are all mighty fatiguing, involving a lot of walking and climbing for about eight hours during the day and another two or three after dark. Van and George now go out together and Vernon and young Barrie Fisher do like- wise, at night, that is. My work is done alone but I do not go deep into the scrub after dark. The things I am after lie close to the ground and my noisy approach would alarm them whereas the things the others are after are, in the main, arboreal. I meant to say something about this locality but so far have not done so. Our trip from Portland Roads was somewhere around eighteen miles, in a direc- ion about west-south-west. We crossed first Packer's Creek, then Chili Creek and finally Dirty Water Creek, none of thish saw on the map. The ground rose after the last named and we crossed a range, nameless, I think, of sandstone, from the summit of which the ocean was visible to our east. To reach the range we passed through fairly profuse forest and on top of it a very sparse forest. Travelling down the west side of the ridge we entered deep scrub again which extends as far as we can see, although the next ridge, Iron Range itself, is many times higher than that to our east. In no place is the altitude very high: the ridge we crossed probably was not more than four hundred feet, Iron Range is perhaps six to eight jindred and Mount Tozer, the high point in the district, which comes later in out jour- ney, is seventeen hundred feet. We are in between two branches of the Claudie River, the Claudie itself and the North Claudie. Both are mere streams of not much more than twenty feet in width but somewhere south of us they join and at its mouth, about eight or nine miles away, it becomes something of a river. It is in that part of its length that the crocodiles gather; up here it is too nar- row for them to manouevr, though the water is muddy and stagnant and I would think several times before going swimming. We have not been here a week yet and our plans call for about three weeks in this camp. We have two more scheduled, one nearer the mouth of the Claudie and the other on the slopes of Mount Tozerm but the duration in each of the camps depends of course on the results obtained in each of them. Mammals are not doing any too well and Len is not getting very good results in his botanical searches so it may be that we shall stay less than the allotted three weeks. We have received the transportation bill from Doug Fisher with what looks like a L2 error in his favor but I shall pay it without argument. I learn from the miners that he has a reputation for overcharging, when he can get away with it, and he is far from popular with the other inhabitants. His statement lists him as D. St. F-R Fisher and I was informed that he claims kinship with the Marquis of Bute which would probably be a surprise to the Marquis. He did not seem to think it necessary to impress me with his background of high degree but apparently does so when he thinks he can make an impression or obtain some credence. It all reacts against Barrie and must cause him considerable em- brassment. Barrie himself, Doug's step-son, is a very fine sort of lad and if given a chance would go far, I think. He is quiet, polite, well-mannered and of course has a good stock of bush lore. The Queensland or Australian Museums would be lucky to get such a boy but of course he has little chance of reaching them.