The Arunta is probably the largest tribe in Central Australia, and occupies a tract of country extending from the Macumba River in the south to seventy miles north of the Macdonnell Ranges, a total distance of about four hundred miles; how far the tribe extends east and west there is no means of knowing with anything like accuracy. The country which it now occupies is very varied in nature. The southern part is Steppe land, gradually rising from an elevation of only seventy-four feet at the Macumba River to two thousand feet in the north, where the Macdonnell Ranges run across from east to west, with, here and there, bold peaks and cliffs reaching the height of nearly five thousand feet. To the north again of the Macdonnell Ranges, the Burt Plains reach an elevation of three thousand feet. During the winter months the climate is, for the most part, delightful. The days are warm, bright and clear, with a strong, refreshing, south-east wind almost every day. The nights are cold, the thermometer often falling several degrees below freezing point, but the air is so dry that the cold is but very little felt, even when you wake up to find your water bags frozen solid.