We Had As Yet Seen No Inhabitants, And Very Few Signs
That The Country Is Inhabited At All.
Fish, flesh, and fowl are
abundant, but there are no human beings to enjoy them but ourselves:
native dogs are in considerable numbers, and keep up during the night a
continual howling.
June 12. - We this day passed over a very beautiful country, thinly
wooded, and apparently safe from the highest floods; the river had
considerable windings, but was of noble width and appearance; the
rapids were few, and offered no obstruction; its medium width from one
hundred and fifty to two hundred and fifty feet, and in many reaches
much more. On one of the higher back ridges there are some good iron
bark trees, with abundance of cypress; the apple, blue gum, and box,
were the principal trees growing on the flats. Kangaroos were in very
great numbers: our dogs took four; they were of that species called by
Dr. Smith macropus elegans, and are very rare on the east coast. The
stones and rocks were generally hard whinstone, or freestone, the former
in large masses; the beach, of pebbles of all colours and kinds, from
quartz to sandstone. About a mile from our resting-place, we passed the
mouth of the small rivulet named in the former journey Elizabeth's Burn;
the stream now in it was inconsiderable.
June 13. - Our route during this day's journey was generally over a very
level country, the land three or four miles back from the river very
inferior to that on the borders of it, being covered with small trees
and brush; the soil a light, red loam.
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