CHAPTER IV. THE COLONY OF NEW SOUTH WALES-THE HARBOUR OF PORT JACKSON-THE CITY OF SYDNEY-THE PARAMATTA RIVER-THE GENERAL FEATURES, AND PRESENT CONDITION OF THE COLONY. It was on the morning of the 26th day of January, 1788, that the first settlement in this the oldest colony in Australia was founded under Captain Phillip, after he had quitted the less favourable station at Botany Bay. "The spot chosen for encampment," says Colonel Collins, in his interesting account of the settlement, 66 was at the head of the cove near the run of fresh water which stole silently along through a very thick wood, the stillness of which had then, for the first time since the creation, been disturbed by the rude sounds of the labourer's axe and the downfall of its ancient inhabitants; a stillness and tranquillity which from that day were to give place to the voice of labour, the confusion of camps and towns, and the busy hum of its new possessors." In the evening of the day the whole of the party that had come round in the Supply assembled at the point where they had first landed in the morning, and on which a flagstaff had been erected and an Union Jack displayed; the body of marines that were with them fired several volleys in honour of the occasion, startling from the surrounding woods whole flocks of gorgeous birds, and making the forests echo with a reverberatory welcome; while between each peal the governor and officers drank the healths of his Majesty and the Royal Family, and success to the new colony, accompanied by the shouts of the whole party. On every succeeding 26th of January from that period the day has been uniformly observed with rejoicings, and each anniversary has shown a continued realization of the good wishes of that first little party for the prosperity of the colony. A lapse of sixty-four years has shown a wondrous change. It has been said by Count Strzelecki that "the Anglo-Saxon reproduces his country wherever he hoists his country's flag ;" and certainly in no other place in the world is this more evident than at the metropolis of New South Wales; for while the pioneers of civilization, leaving behind them the pleasures and comforts of home and kindred, landed from their vessel to take possession of a newly discovered country on the other side of the globe, tenanted by the wild and savage inhabitants of the woods, and the capabilities of which were not merely undeveloped but absolutely unknown; the emigrant of the present day, on arriving at Sydney, is at once introduced to a flourishing city, inhabited by a civilized people, in a country where every necessary and luxury of life are produced and available in abundance. The voyage from England to Australia, averaging from three to four months, is now so much a matter of course, and so proverbially safe, that no person in undertaking it makes any calculation of its dangers; it was not, however, so considered by those who embarked in the first fleet, for Colonel Collins, in his record of that voyage, says, "Thus under the blessing of God was happily completed in eight months and one week a voyage, which, before it was undertaken, the mind hardly dared to contemplate, and on which it was impossible to reflect without some apprehension of its termination." It was with feelings such as these that the first European navigators of Port Jackson entered the heads and broke the silence and solitude that had reigned in those distant regions since their creation; and the following lines, descriptive of another locality, might not inaptly have been applied to the scene that was then presented to their view: "All is as still as death! wild solitude Reigns undisturb'd along the voiceless shore, The God of nature in the desert drear, Might sure have found a fit sojourning here." The rocks, forming the coast in the neighbourhood of Port Jackson, and the shores of the bay itself, consist entirely of sandstone, extending in nearly horizontal layers, south as far as Illawarra, and north as far as Newcastle. At these points the sandstone is broken through by the intrusion of trap-rock, forming the Illawarra Mountain on the south, and Nobby's Island, near Newcastle, on the north. The whole of the intervening coast-line forms an abrupt mural escarpment, rising in many places, as at the south head, to an elevation of from 250 to 300 feet. The only interruptions to the continuity of this line, are those of Port Hacken, Botany Bay, Port Jackson, Broken Bay, Tuggerah Beach, and Reid's Mistake. These inlets have all the same general physical aspect, consisting of a series of indentations, or coves, bounded by a succession of terraces of sandstone (apparently five in number), resembling in form ancient sea beaches; the rocks at the foot of each terrace being water-worn and excavated. The supposition that these terraces are the remains of ancient sea beaches, receives confirmation from the fact that at the base of many of them are found large deposits of seashells, identical with those inhabiting the sea below. Many of these shells, too, are almost microscopic in size, and exist in such quantities, and are so widely distributed, as to set aside the suggestion of their having been brought to their present locality by the aborigines of the country. Geology, taking a more philosophical view of the fact, demonstrates that these shells have been deposited by the waves of the ocean, and that the land on which we now dwell has undergone a series of upheavings, equal in number to the terraces or sea-coasts still visible in the formation of the rocks. This view of the case will appear novel only to those who have never turned their attention to geological phenomena, for the features of the country around us are in perfect harmony with what is observed on other parts of the earth's surface. The whole of the west coast of South America, extending from the base to the summit of the Andes, consists of a succession of such ridges as we find on the shores of Australia; and the same phenomenon is observable in innumerable other instances. On the steep sides of Snow |