In The North The
Occupied Country Is Confined To The Watersheds Of The Two Main Rivers,
The Fitzroy And The Ord.
To the Eastward of Perth the populous mining towns and many scattered
mining camps and settlements extend some five hundred miles towards the
interior.
In spite of the discovery of gold and the advance of the Colony
in every way, there still remains more than half the province unoccupied.
How scattered the population of the settled country is may be judged from
the fact that the average population is one individual to every six square
miles. The vast, almost unknown, interior well merits its designation of
"Desert," and I suppose that in few parts of the world have travellers
had greater difficulties to overcome than in the arid, sun-dried
wilderness of interior Australia. The many attempts to penetrate beyond
the head-waters of the coastal rivers date from the earliest days of the
Swan River Settlement. But in every case travellers, bold and enduring,
were forced back by the impassable nature of the sandy deserts - impassable
to all except camels. Roe, Hunt, Austin, and the Gregorys made more than
one effort to solve the mysteries of the interior. Numerous attempts were
made to cross the Colony from West to East or VICE VERSA, with the double
object of ascertaining whether the nature of the country rendered it
suitable for settlement, and of establishing some means of communication
with the sister colonies to the East.
The first who succeeded in travelling overland from South to West
Australia was Eyre, afterwards made governor of Jamaica.
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