318 BIOGRAPHICAL. SKETCH OF THE 



On the 19th, they crossed the Field River of Oxley, and 

 reached Liverpool Plains on the 21st, and finally returned to 

 their starting-point Segenhoe, on Hunter's River, on the 

 28th, having, in an absence of thirteen weeks, travelled up- 

 wards of eight hundred miles. The result of this journey 

 was the acquirement of a knowledge of a portion of the in- 

 terior lying north from the parallel of 31° S., to almost the 

 shores of Moreton Bay, in 27° 30' S., and between the meri- 

 dian of 150" E. and the coast line.* 



A remarkable feature in their tour was the paucity of 

 inhabitants in the varied districts they travelled over. Five 

 times only, in the prosecution of their journey were the abo- 

 rigines seen, when, either in consequence of their timid dis- 

 positions, and the great alarm excited by the appearance of 

 the packhorses, or other circumstances, Mr Cunningham's 

 communication with them was entirely prevented, and no 

 remark on their persons or their language could be made. 

 The few who suffered the travellers for the moment to view 

 them at a distance appeared to be tall and well-formed, and 

 of rather athletic make; possessing the same description of 

 weapons as the aborigines, who more fully peopled the shores 

 in the vicinity of Port Jackson; with whom, as being of the 

 same primitive stock, they appeared to be fully identified, 

 not simply in their general conformation, but in their wan- 

 dering unsettled habits, and the full exercise of those savage 

 instincts, by which they find their food in the trees, and their 

 path through the forest. 



Having afforded his people and horses a week's rest at 

 Segenhoe, Mr Cunningham quitted that station on the 5th 

 of August, with the intention of returning to the colony by 

 the way of Bathurst, owing to the broken rocky character of 

 the country in the vicinity of Mount Dangar, round the south- 



* For more lengthened details of this journey, vide The Australian 

 Quarterly Journal for January and April, 1828. The Journal of the 

 Royal Geographical Society of London, Vol. II., p. 99, 1832; and 

 Proceedings of the Geological Society of London, Vol. II., p. '09, 

 1834.5. 



