expedition quitted it. In the year 1824, however, Messrs. Hovell and Hume, two influential settlers in the Sydney district, determined upon attempting to reach the abandoned settlement overland. The account of their journey affords one a tolerable idea of the difficulties of inland exploration, and of the indomitable energy required to overcome them. Their travelling equipage, at the commencement of their journey, consisted of two carts, containing supplies, drawn by four bullocks; these were accompanied by six men, each armed with a fowlingpiece; and the two horses ridden by themselves, with a spare horse, completed their outfit. Departing from Lake George, they left the last trace of civilization behind, and entered at once into the wide expanse of an unknown interior, guided only by a small compass and the calculations made with an imperfect sextant.

At the distance of eleven miles they met the Murrumbidgee. This stream, thirty or forty yards wide, presented in its swollen waters a bar to their further progress for the space of two days; after which, finding delay useless, they contrived to form a punt out of one of the carts, by tying a tarpauling tightly round the bottom of the vehicle. From this point, having transported themselves and their goods dry and in safety to the opposite shore, they pursued

a W.S.W. course for four days, when, from the mountainous character of the country before them, it was judged advisable to abandon the carts and such quantities of the provisions as could most easily be spared, concealing them till their return. From this hastily constructed dépôt they advanced for seventy miles over difficult ranges, precipitous ravines, and opposing streams, relieved at intervals by strips of lightly wooded pastoral grounds, until they came suddenly and unexpectedly in view of a belt of stupendous mountains, the Australian Alps. Here their course was necessarily altered a few points to the westward, to enable them to avoid the diverging branches of this enormous chain; and after a journey of eighty-five miles, they discovered a river (the Hume), the breadth of which could not have been less than eighty yards. Two or three days were spent on the banks of this beautiful stream, in the endeavour to find a convenient crossing-place. Pursuing their course, they came, at the distance of thirty-four miles, to another, though much smaller river, which they called the "Ovens;" crossing which, they altered the course of their route to a more southerly direction, and at the distance of 109 miles they met with and crossed a fourth river, the Hovell (the Golbourn of Major Mitchell). The region passed over be

tween these last two rivers had presented a very favourable aspect, being enriched with fertile plains, open or park-like forests, and numerous streams. The land contiguous to the Hovell was found to be of a quality fitted for every purpose, pastoral and agricultural.

The passage of this stream accomplished, they continued their journey in a S.W. direction, through an agreeable and picturesque country, the soil good and the grass abundant, for eight days, when they were checked by the rugged, stony surface of a mountain they attempted to cross, and the dense and impenetrable nature of its brushwood and jungle grass. To this mountain they gave the name of Mount Disappointment; and, baffled in their attempt to find a breach in the rocky rampart which it formed across their path, they turned their steps, with the intention of passing round its flank. This they accomplished by making a long and tedious detour in a westerly direction; and then once more resuming their proper course, finally received the reward of all their toils by descrying the sea in the distance.

In thus bringing their attempts to a successful close, they had spent two months of hardship, of the severity of which none but those who enter these solitudes can form a conception, and had travelled a distance of 378 miles,

reckoning in a straight line from the point of their departure. It was the misfortune of these energetic explorers, to have been guided by their anxiety to take the shortest and most direct route, and not that which presented the fewest impediments, and they thus entangled themselves amidst the lofty lateral ranges which the Australian Alps throw off to the westward. Times without number they had to climb with weary steps to the summit of a ridge, only to see Alps beyond Alps" rising in the distance across their course, while on other occasions broad streams and dense jungles opposed scarcely less formidable barriers to their advance.

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The road thus opened was seen to be practicable for man, though at the cost of immense labour; but it was far otherwise with regard to sheep and cattle, and no one at all acquainted with the difficulties of conveying these, especially in large numbers, through a wooded and mountainous region, would willingly pursue a track beset with so many obstacles. The expedition, therefore, was followed by no practical results, and the district of Port Phillip once more relapsed into obscurity.

The unexampled rapidity, however, with which the available land in Van Diemen's Land (situated immediately opposite to that part of the coast of Australia) had been occupied, and

the necessity of finding new tracts of land for pastoral purposes, soon induced the colonists of that island to turn their attention to the advantage of establishing a settlement in a district so proximate and accessible to them; and with this view an association was formed, which, in the month of May, 1835, despatched Mr. Batman as an agent to open up a friendly intercourse with the aborigines, and, if successful, to effect a purchase of as much land as it was possible to procure; and this gentleman succeeded in obtaining the consent of the aboriginal chiefs, the three brothers, "Jagajaga, Jagajaga, and Jagajaga," to assign by deed (of the legal beauties of which they must have been excellent critics) a tract of land of about 600,000 acres, the present value of which is almost incalculable, "for and in consideration of" about 40 pairs of blankets, 130 knives, 40 tomahawks, 40 looking-glasses, 40 pairs of scissors, 12 red shirts, 4 flannel jackets, 4 suits of clothes, 150 pounds of flour, 250 handkerchiefs, and half a dozen shirts, and an annual tribute of two tons of flour, and another "assorted collection" of knives, tomahawks, scissors, looking-glasses, &c., but making the proportion of handkerchiefs to shirts a little more equal. The treaty, however, was not destined to be carried out, for the government refused to recognise it, as