Australia Twice Traversed: The Romance of Exploration, Being a Narrative Compiled from the Journals of Five Exploring Expeditions into and Through Central South Australia and Western Australia, from 1872 to 1876

In Short

This book serves as a primary, journals-based narrative of five separate expeditions conducted between 1872 and 1876, aiming to cross the formidable desert expanses of Central and Western Australia. It chronicles the immense physical toll of the journey—the searing heat, the near-total lack of permanent water, and the constant navigation of treacherous, scrub-filled terrain—alongside the explorer's encounters with the indigenous populations and the logistical nightmare of maintaining a party of men, horses, and eventually camels. The work has endured as a cornerstone of exploration literature, valued not for the polished artifice of a novel, but for its raw, unvarnished detail of the "agony of a practical realisation" inherent in surveying one of the earth's last great terrestrial frontiers. It is a testament to nineteenth-century endurance, capturing the hubris, the isolation, and the profound, haunting beauty of the Australian outback.

The Story

The narrative arc begins at the edge of the known world, specifically from the telegraph stations in South Australia that marked the final outposts of colonial infrastructure. The explorer, driven by an ambition to traverse the continent westward to the Indian Ocean, establishes his base camp and pushes into the unmapped interior. The initial expeditions are characterized by slow, grueling progress along the Finke River, where the party discovers dramatic geological features like Chambers’ Pillar and the immense monoliths of Mount Olga and Ayers Rock. Throughout these early forays, the primary conflict is the scarcity of water; the party moves from one precarious soak or clay-pan to the next, often finding that the previous night’s rain has left no trace on the scorched earth.

As the expeditions continue, the geography grows increasingly hostile. The lush "Fairies’ Glen" or "Glen of Palms" provides only brief reprieves from the relentless "triodia" grass and dense, impenetrable scrub. The atmosphere is consistently one of high-stakes survival. Tensions rise as the party encounters indigenous groups whose land they are traversing; these meetings often escalate from wary observation to open hostilities, with spears hurled and the explorer forced to discharge his firearms to maintain his position. The narrative reaches its most desperate point during the third and fourth journeys, where the lack of water leads to the near-death of the entire party and the tragic disappearance of a companion named Gibson. Left behind in the desert with the instruction to find help, Gibson vanishes into the sandhills, leaving the leader to navigate his own path of survival.

The fifth and final trek represents the culmination of the endeavor. By this time, the explorer has shifted his reliance to camels, which prove better suited to the "hideous sandhills" than the failing horses. The journey becomes a long, lonely march through a region described as a "region of desolation," where the party survives weeks without reliable water, subsisting on the endurance of their animals and the discovery of hidden, deep-rock wells. The final chapters transition from the visceral, immediate danger of the desert to a more reflective tone as the expedition finally strikes the western settled districts. The narrative concludes with the arrival in the colonial centers of Western Australia, where the exhausted party is greeted with banquets and civic honors—a sharp, surreal contrast to the silent, parched wilderness they have just survived. The homecoming is not presented as a triumph of conquest, but as a survival of an ordeal that has left the explorer fundamentally altered by the "sad solitude" of the interior.

How It Unfolds

The departure from the outposts The journey begins at the Peake telegraph station, the last foothold of civilization, as the party prepares for a march into the unknown. The explorer establishes his base and begins the arduous task of mapping the river systems and mountain ranges of the center.

The discovery of monumental landmarks As the expedition pushes into the interior, the party encounters extraordinary geological features, including the towering monoliths of Mount Olga and Ayers Rock. These landmarks serve as both navigational guides and sources of wonder in a landscape otherwise dominated by scrub and sand.

The struggle for water The narrative is driven by the constant, desperate search for water, with the party frequently moving from one dry gully to the next. The explorer describes the physical deterioration of the horses, the failure of shallow tanks, and the intense heat that turns the desert into a "stinking pit."

Conflict with indigenous populations The party repeatedly encounters local groups, leading to moments of high tension and open violence. The explorer documents these clashes with a tone of defensive justification, viewing the aborigines as inevitable obstacles to the progress of discovery.

The loss of a companion In a pivotal turning point, the party is forced to split up due to a total lack of water, resulting in the abandonment of Gibson. The final, unsuccessful search for his remains marks the most somber and haunting segment of the entire journal.

The transition to camels Recognizing the limitations of horses, the explorer shifts his reliance to camels, which prove their worth in the most grueling desert stretches. This change in transport enables the party to survive the long, waterless marches that characterize the final expedition.

The arrival in the west The final, exhausted phase of the journey leads the party into the settled pastoral stations of Western Australia. The narrative concludes with the contrast between the silence of the desert and the formal, civic receptions in the coastal towns, marking the official end of the traverses.

The People

The central figure is the author himself, a man defined by his relentless drive and a singular, almost obsessive devotion to the task of exploration. He is a Victorian pragmatist who views the Australian landscape as a challenge to be overcome through sheer force of will, though he is frequently prone to poetic outbursts when describing the "sublime" or "grotesque" natural features he encounters. He is deeply skeptical of fiction, believing that the "real" experience of survival dwarfs any invented drama.

His primary companion for much of the journey is Mr. Tietkens, a steady, capable presence who serves as a vital sounding board and partner in the scientific work of taking bearings and mapping the terrain. Their relationship is characterized by professional reliance and a shared stoicism. Gibson, the ill-fated member of the party, is portrayed as a man of lesser experience and different temperament; his disappearance serves as a haunting reminder of the fragility of the human endeavor. Through the explorer's eyes, Gibson is a tragic figure, one who ultimately succumbed to the vastness of the space he tried to cross.

Finally, the indigenous inhabitants appear throughout the text as a shadow presence, both as "sable friends" who occasionally assist and as "warriors" or "fiends" who obstruct the party’s movement. The explorer’s interactions with them are marked by a deep cultural disconnect; he views them as an integral, if hostile, part of the landscape's challenges, rarely interrogating his own role as a "trespasser." This distance highlights the era’s attitudes, as he balances a grudging admiration for their knowledge of the country with a profound fear of their "atrocities." Together, these figures create a study in contrast: the disciplined explorer, his weary companions, and the indigenous population they encounter in a land that feels indifferent to them all.

In Its Own Voice

"The ground is soft after the late rains. I said we camped a mile below a gorge; at night I found my position to be in latitude 23 degrees 40', and longitude 132 degrees 31', the variation 3 degrees east."

This entry demonstrates the explorer’s obsessive commitment to recording the exact geographical coordinates of every camp, regardless of the hardship involved.

"The horses did not finish the water, there being nearly sufficient to give them another drink. The grass was good here, as a little flat, on which grew some yellow immortelles, had recently been burnt."

This passage captures the constant, underlying anxiety of the expedition, where the discovery of a small amount of water is treated as a moment of profound gratitude and relief.

"I had set my own and all my companions' lives upon a cast, and will stand the hazard of the die, and I may add that each one displayed at starting into the new unknown, the greatest desire and eagerness for our attempt."

Reflecting on the beginning of the final, most dangerous expedition, this line underscores the explorer's awareness of the mortal risks and his unwavering commitment to the mission.

What It's Really About

At its core, the book is an argument for the inherent value of "truth" over "imagination." The author makes an explicit plea for the reader to abandon the "imaginary tales of adventure" that were popular in the nineteenth century in favor of the "sublime records" of actual exploration. He contends that the reality of human suffering, endurance, and the slow, methodical mapping of the unknown holds a moral and intellectual weight that fiction cannot reach.

Beneath the plot lies a deep preoccupation with the nature of the "unknown." The author is not merely traversing a map; he is testing the limits of human agency against a geography that is effectively timeless and indifferent. The recurring questions center on the cost of discovery: What is the price of adding a name to a mountain or a range? Who has the right to occupy a space that has been "empty" to the Western eye for millennia? The author’s internal struggle—caught between his scientific pride and his visceral, often terrifying encounters with the desert—reveals an underlying anxiety about his place in this vast, "ancient and sublime" country. The book serves as a record of a man trying to impose meaning on a landscape that constantly threatens to erase him.

Why Read It Today

Readers who enjoy historical narratives, particularly those with a focus on survival and the grit of Victorian-era discovery, will find this a deeply rewarding, if challenging, experience. The book offers an unvarnished look at the physical reality of the Australian interior before it was fully tamed by modern technology. There is a distinct, rhythmic quality to the prose—a blend of scientific log-keeping and romanticized observation—that captures the isolation of the outback. It feels, at times, like being inside the head of a man who has not seen another person for weeks, where the smallest details—a single flower, a change in the color of a rock, the movement of an ant—take on massive significance.

However, the reader must be prepared for the realities of the text. The pacing is dictated by the slow, painful progress of the expedition itself, which means the narrative can be repetitive and dense with lists of creeks, ranges, and temperature readings. Furthermore, the period attitudes towards the indigenous inhabitants are often jarring; the explorer’s perspective is colored by the colonial assumptions of his time, and those looking for a contemporary or sympathetic view of the native experience will find the text problematic. Yet, precisely because of these elements, the book is a significant historical artifact. It does not hide the prejudices or the hubris of the era, and it offers an honest, sometimes brutal account of what it meant to walk into a place that the world had not yet claimed. It leaves the reader with a haunting sense of the vastness of the Australian continent and the fragility of the small parties of men who dared to cross it.