54 MURCHISON, LYONS, AND GASCOYNE RIVERS. [Nov. 8, 1858. 



many years ago, I was enabled to be of some little use to liim, and in grati- 

 tude he named after me one of the rivers that he discovered. It was supposed 

 that this river would turn out only a poor stream through a barren saline 

 country ; but I am glad to hear that it is so productive. Moreover, I find 

 they have named two of its affluents the "lloderick" and tlie "Impey." 

 To pass from that part of the subject, I consider the paper one of great value. 

 Western Australia is rapidly extending into importance. We have long 

 wished to know whether a large and rich tract of country might not be colo- 

 nised to the north. Mr. Gregory has assured us that such tracts do exist, 

 and has also shown that there are copper-mines, iron, and other ore in great 

 abundance. Mr. 1\ Gregory is one of the three younger brothers of our 

 Medallist, and they are all good geographical explorers. 



Mr. J. G. Austin. — I have been a resident in Western Australia from 

 thirteen to fourteen years, and I have had a personal acquaintance with the 

 family of Mr. Gregory, and can speak to their energy and competency, and 

 to the credit which their statements deserve. Some three or four years ago 

 the tribes who communicate one with another in a chain down to Swan , 

 River, gave us to understand that birds mentioned by Mr. Gregory came from 

 a good country. Consequently an exploration was formed for the purpose of 

 discovering whether it was so or not. The discovery by Mr. Gregory of this 

 bird, which had not been seen on the Swan River, except in 1854, during the 

 last twenty years, proves, in my opinion, that there is a great extent of good 

 land in the neighbourhood in which it was found by Mr. Gregory. It is 

 apprehended that the great distance at which the land is situated from 

 head quarters will for a time prevent the colonists from taking advantage 

 of it ; and a report is current that to the east and north-east (at about 250 

 to 300 miles east of the Swan River) there is an impenetrable belt of under- 

 wood, which the natives say is forty miles through, and impossible to be 

 penetrated, and which presents an insuperable barrier to further exploration 

 of the interior of the great continent of Australia from the western coast. 



Mil. J. Crawfurd, f.r.g.s. — I wish to say a few words upon those produc- 

 tions which are said to characterise the river Murchison — a very good name, 

 and I wish the river were worthy of it — the wild tobacco, the musk-melon, 

 and the water-melon. As to the wild tobacco, I believe that to be perfectly 

 correct, and say so on the authority of my late excellent friend Robert Brown. 

 But he assured me it was of no value as a production. The land watered by 

 the Murchison is the first part of Australia in which I have heard of anything 

 like an esculent tuber resembling that of the Convolvulus batata — the potato. 

 Will any botanist present assure us that this is the true batata? because if it 

 were so, or indeed any esculent tuber, the natives in this part of Australia 

 ought, cultivating it and feeding on it, to have been found in a higher state 

 of civilisation than any Australians have yet attained. With respect to the 

 musk and water-melon, Mr. Gregory must have mistaken something else for 

 them, because they are really the productions of certain parts of Asia. I am 

 glad to hear of this fertile territory of the river Murchison. It will no doubt 

 be quite favourable for the production of wool, and a very different country 

 for the sheep from the hot tropical region of Australia to which some gentle- 

 men have been proposing to push their runs. 



