abandon his purpose; he started for the eastern coast, crossed the New England Range, and descended the long woodland slopes to the sea, discovering on his way the river Hastings.
2. Allan Cunningham.—Several important discoveries were effected by an enthusiastic botanist named Allan Cunningham, who, in his search for new plants, succeeded in opening up country which had been previously unknown. In 1825 he found a passage over the Liverpool Range, through a wild and picturesque gap, which he called the Pandora Pass; and on the other side of the mountains he discovered the fine pastoral lands of the Liverpool Plains and the Darling Downs, which are watered by three branches of the Upper Darling—the Peel, the Gwydir, and the Dumaresq. The squatters were quick to take advantage of these discoveries; and, after a year or two, this district was covered with great flocks of sheep. It was here that the Australian Agricultural Company formed their great stations already referred to.
3. Hume and Hovell.—The southern coasts of the district now called Victoria had been carefully explored by Flinders and other sailors, but the country which lay behind these coasts was quite unknown. In 1824 Governor Brisbane suggested a novel plan of exploration; he proposed to land a party of convicts at Wilson’s Promontory, with instructions to work their way through the interior to Sydney, where they would receive their freedom. The charge of the party was offered to Hamilton Hume, a young native of the colony, and a most expert and intrepid bushman. He was of an energetic and determined, though somewhat domineering disposition, and was anxious to distinguish himself in the work of exploration. He declined to undertake the expedition in the manner proposed by Governor Brisbane, but offered to conduct a party of convicts from Sydney to the southern coasts. A sea-captain named Hovell asked permission to accompany him. With these two as leaders, and six convict servants to make up the party, they set out from Lake George, carrying their provisions in two carts, drawn by teams of oxen. As soon as they met the Murrumbidgee their troubles commenced; the river was so broad and swift that it was difficult to see how they could carry their goods across. Hume covered the carts with tarpaulin, so as to make them serve as punts. Then he swam across the river, carrying the end of a rope between his teeth; and with this he pulled over the loaded punts. The men and oxen then swam across, and once more pushed forward. But the country through which they had now to pass was so rough and woody that they were obliged to abandon their carts and load the oxen with their provisions. They journeyed on, through hilly country, beneath the shades of deep and far-spreading forests; to their left they sometimes caught a glimpse of the snow-capped peaks of the Australian Alps, and at length they reached the banks of a clear and rapid stream, which they called the Hume, but which is now known as the Murray. Their carts being no longer available, they had to construct boats of wicker-work and cover them with tarpaulin. Having crossed the river, they entered the lightly timbered slopes to the north of Victoria, and holding their course south-west, they discovered first the river Ovens, and then a splendid stream which they called the Hovell, now known as the Goulburn. Their great object, however, was to reach the ocean, and every morning when they left their camping-place they were sustained by the hope of coming, before evening, in view of the open sea. But day after day passed, without any prospect of a termination to their journey. Hume and Hovell, seeing a high peak at some little distance, left the rest of the party to themselves for a few days, and with incredible labour ascended the mountain, in the expectation of beholding from its summit the great Southern Ocean in the distance. Nothing was to be seen, however, but the waving tops of gum trees rising ridge after ridge away to the south. Wearily they retraced their steps to the place where the others were encamped. They called this peak Mount Disappointment. Having altered the direction of their course a little, in a few days they were rejoiced by the sight of a great expanse of water. Passing through country which they declared to resemble, in its freshness and beauty, the well-kept park of an English nobleman, they reached a bay, which the natives called Geelong. Here a dispute took place between the leaders, Hovell asserting that the sheet of water before them was Western Port, Hume that it was Port Phillip. Hume expressed the utmost contempt for Hovell’s ignorance; Hovell retorted with sarcasms on Hume’s dogmatism and conceit; and the rest of the journey was embittered by so great an amount of ill-feeling that the two explorers were never again on friendly terms. Hume’s careful and sagacious observations of the route by which they had come enabled him to lead the party rapidly and safely back to Sydney, where the leaders were rewarded with grants of land and the convicts with tickets-of-leave.
4. Captain Sturt.—The long drought which occurred between 1826 and 1828 suggested to Governor Darling the idea that, as the swamps which had impeded Oxley’s progress would be then dried up, the exploration of the river Macquarie would not present the same difficulties as formerly. The charge of organising an expedition was given to Captain Sturt, who was to be accompanied by Hume, with a party of two soldiers and eight convicts. They carried with them portable boats; but when they reached the Macquarie they found its waters so low as to be incapable of floating them properly. Trudging on foot along the banks of the river they reached the place where Oxley had turned back. It was no longer a marsh; but, with the intense heat, the clay beneath their feet was baked and hard; there was the same dreary stretch of reeds, now withered and yellow under the glare of the sun. Sturt endeavoured to penetrate this solitude, but the physical exertion of pushing their way through the reeds was too great for them. If they paused to rest, they were almost suffocated in the hot and pestilent air; the only sound they could hear was the distant booming of the bittern, and a feeling of the most lonely wretchedness pervaded the scene. At length they were glad to leave this dismal region and strike to the west through a flat and monotonous district where the shells and claws of crayfish told of frequent inundations. Through this plain there flowed a river, which Sturt called the Darling, in honour of the Governor. They followed this river for about ninety miles, and then took their way back to Sydney, Sturt being now able to prove that the belief in the existence of a great inland sea was erroneous.
5. The Murray.—In 1829, along with a naturalist named Macleay, Sturt was again sent out to explore the interior, and on this occasion carried his portable boats to the Murrumbidgee, on which he embarked his party of eight convicts. They rowed with a will, and soon took the boat down the river beyond its junction with the Lachlan. The stream then became narrow, a thick growth of overhanging trees shut out the light from above, while, beneath, the rushing waters bore them swiftly over dangerous snags and through whirling rapids, until they were suddenly shot out into the broad surface of a noble stream which flowed gently over its smooth bed of sand and pebbles. This river they called the Murray; but it was afterwards found to be only the lower portion of the stream which had been crossed by Hume and Hovell several years before.
Sturt’s manner of journeying was to row from sunrise to sunset, then land on the banks of the river and encamp for the night. This exposed the party to some dangers from the suspicious natives, who often mustered in crowds of several hundreds; but Sturt’s kindly manner and pleasant smile always converted them into friends, so that the worst mishap he had to record was the loss of his frying-pan and other utensils, together with some provisions, which were stolen by the blacks in the dead of night. After twilight the little encampment was often swarming with dark figures; but Sturt joined in their sports, and Macleay especially became a great favourite with them by singing comic songs, at which the dusky crowds roared with laughter. The natives are generally good- humoured, if properly managed; and throughout Sturt’s trip the white men and the blacks contrived to spend a very friendly and sociable time together.
After following the Murray for about two hundred miles below the Lachlan they reached a place where a large river flowed from the north into the Murray. This was the mouth of the river Darling, which Sturt himself had previously discovered and named. He now turned his boat into it, in order to examine it for a short distance; but after they had rowed a mile or two they came to a fence of stakes, which the natives had stretched across the river for the purpose of catching fish. Rather than break the fence, and so destroy the labours of the blacks, Sturt turned to sail back. The natives had been concealed on the shore to watch the motions of the white men, and seeing their considerate conduct, they came forth upon the bank and gave a loud shout of satisfaction. The party in the boat unfurled the British flag, and answered with three hearty cheers, as they slowly drifted down with the current. This humane disposition was characteristic of Captain Sturt, who, in after life, was able to say that he had never—either directly or indirectly—caused the death of a black fellow.
When they again entered on the Murray they were carried gently by the current—first to the west, then to the south; and, as they went onward, they found the river grow deeper and wider, until it spread into a broad sheet of water, which they called Lake Alexandrina, after the name of our present Queen, who was then the Princess Alexandrina Victoria. On crossing this lake they found the passage to the ocean blocked up by a great bar of sand, and were forced to turn their boat round and face the current, with the prospect of a toilsome journey of a thousand miles before they could reach home. They had to work hard at their oars, Sturt taking his turn like the rest. At length they entered the Murrumbidgee; but their food was now failing, and the labour of pulling against the stream
