If The Rudeness And Imperfection Of The Tools
With Which They Work Be Considered, It Must Be Confessed To Be An Operation
Of Great Toil And Difficulty.]
Having remained out three days, we returned to our quarters at Rose-hill,
with the pleasing intelligence of our discovery.
The country we had passed
through we found tolerably plain, and little encumbered with underwood,
except near the river side. It is entirely covered with the same sorts
of trees as grow near Sydney; and in some places grass springs up luxuriantly;
other places are quite bare of it. The soil is various: in many parts
a stiff and clay, covered with small pebbles; in other places, of a soft
loamy nature: but invariably, in every part near the river, it is
a coarse sterile sand. Our observations on it (particularly mine,
from carrying the compass by which we steered) were not so numerous as might
have been wished. But, certainly, if the qualities of it be such as to deserve
future cultivation, no impediment of surface, but that of cutting down
and burning the trees, exists, to prevent its being tilled.
To this river the governor gave the name of Nepean. The distance of the part
of the river which we first hit upon from the sea coast, is about 39 miles,
in a direct line almost due west.
A survey of Botany Bay took place in September. I was of the party,
with several others officers. We continued nine days in the bay,
during which time, the relative position of every part of it, to the extent
of more than thirty miles, following the windings of the shore,
was ascertained, and laid down on paper, by captain Hunter.
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