The General Description Of Country Was Nearly The Same As That Which We
Passed Over On Preceding Days; Several Pieces Of Limestone Were Found,
Which Proved Of Good Quality.
On going between three and four miles,
ascending a range of hills which lay directly across our course, we
Had
a prospect of a fine and spacious valley, bounded to the east by low
grassy hills; there was every appearance of a watercourse being in it,
but it was distant five or six miles, and our access to it was rendered
difficult by lofty rocky hills forming deep and irregular glens, so
narrow that I feared we should not be able to follow their windings, the
rocks rising in such vast perpendicular shapes as seemingly to debar
our passage. After some little hesitation, we found a place down which
the horses might descend in safety. This being accomplished, we
traversed the bottom of the glen along all its windings for nearly three
miles and a half: a fine stream of pure water was running through it.
Here, doubtful of being able before dark to gain the valley we were in
search of we halted for the night. It is impossible to imagine a more
beautifully romantic glen than that in which we lay. There was just
level space on either side of the stream for the horses to travel along,
the rocks rising almost perpendicularly from it to a towering height,
covered with flowering acacia of various species, whose bright yellow
flowers were contrasted and mingled with the more sombre foliage of the
blue gum and cypress trees: several new plants were also found, of
beautiful descriptions.
The stream in the glen running north-easterly encouraged us to hope that
we should ultimately be rewarded by finding a considerable stream in the
valley, which was the cause of our deviation from our more direct course
to Bathurst. The glen which was to afford us access to it, we named
Glenfinlass: it might, perhaps, be properly termed the glen of many
windings, as it was formed of several detached lofty hills; between each
of which deep ravines were formed, communicating in times of rain their
waters to this main one.
August 19. - Full of the hopes entertained yesterday, at half past eight
o'clock we pursued our course down Glenfinlass. A mile and a half
brought us into the valley which we had seen on our first descending
into the glen: imagination cannot fancy anything more beautifully
picturesque than the scene which burst upon us. The breadth of the
valley to the base of the opposite gently rising hills was, between
three and four miles, studded with fine trees, upon a soil which for
richness can nowhere he excelled; its extent north and south we could
not see: to the west it was bounded by the lofty rocky ranges by which
we had entered it; this was covered to the summit with cypresses and
acacia in full bloom: a few trees of the sterculia heterophylla, with
their bright green foliage, gave additional beauty to the scene. In the
centre of this charming valley ran a strong and beautiful stream, its
bright transparent waters dashing over a gravelly bottom, intermingled
with large stones, forming at short intervals considerable pools, in
which the rays of the sun were reflected With a brilliancy equal to that
of the most polished mirror. I should have been well contented to have
found this to be the Macquarie River, and at first conceived it to be
so. Under this impression, I intended stopping upon its banks for the
remainder of the day, and then proceeding up the stream southerly.
Whilst we were waiting for the horses to come up we crossed the stream,
and wishing to see as much of the country on its banks northerly, as
possible, I proceeded down the stream, and had scarcely rode a mile when
I was no less astonished than delighted to find that it joined a very
fine river, coming from the east-south-east from among the chain of low
grassy hills, bounding the east side of the valley in which we were.
This then was certainly the long sought Macquarie, the sight of which
amply repaid us for all our former disappointments. Different in every
respect from the Lachlan, it here formed a river equal to the Hawkesbury
at Windsor, and in many parts as wide as the Nepean at Emu Plains. These
noble streams were connected by rapids running over a rocky and pebbly
bottom, but not fordable, much resembling the reaches and falls at the
crossing place at Emuford, only deeper: the water was bright, and
transparent, and we were fortunate enough to see it at a period when it
was neither swelled beyond its proper dimensions by mountain floods, nor
contracted by summer droughts. From its being at least four times larger
than it is at Bathurst, even in a favourable season, it must have
received great accessions of water from the mountains north-easterly;
for from the course it has run from Bathurst, and the number of streams
we have crossed all running to form it from the south and south-west, I
do not think it can receive many more from that quarter between us and
Bathurst, at least of sufficient strength to have formed the
present river.
Reduced as our provisions were, we could not resist the temptation of
halting in this beautiful country for a couple of days, to allow us time
to ascertain its precise situation, and to ride down the banks of the
river northerly as far as we could go and return in one day. The banks
of the river in our neighbourhood were low and grassy, with a margin of
gravel and pebble stones; there were marks of flood to the height of
about twelve feet, when the river would still be confined within its
secondary banks, and not overflow the rich lands that border it. Its
proper width in times of flood would be from six to eight hundred feet,
its present and usual width is about two hundred feet.
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