228 THE MURRAY. [1839. 



the tide often rises to the height of thirty feet ; but the lar- 

 gest of them, the Prince Regent, is not navigable for boats 

 more than fifty miles from its mouth, including all its tortu- 

 osities. On the southern coast are the Blackwood, which 

 falls into Flinder's Bay near the lloth meridian, and the 

 Kalgan, or French river, about one hundred and fifty miles 

 further east, which debouches into Oyster Harbor, the north 

 part of King George's Sound. About sixteen miles east of 

 Cape Northumberland, is the mouth of the Glenelg, one of 

 the largest coast rivers in Australia : its source is in the 

 Grampians, seventy miles from the sea ; it has numerous af- 

 fluents, and, counting its windings, is upwards of one hun- 

 dred and thirty miles in length ; it presents a narrow outlet 

 to the sea, the entrance of which is choked up by sand-bars, 

 but it soon expands, and, with this exception, is a wide *nd 

 deep stream throughout its whole course. 



There is no other river of importance on the southern 

 coast, except the Murray, which rises in the Warragongs, 

 and empties into Encounter Bay, in longitude 139° E At 

 its mouth it appears to be an insignificant stream, but, in 

 fact, it includes within its basin an area of more than four 

 hundred thousand square miles, and carries off the surplus 

 waters of a great number of the rivers of the interior, whose 

 systems, as has been before remarked, are yet undeveloped. 

 Its principal tributaries are the Macquarrie, Lachlan, Mor- 

 rumbidgee, and Darling. The first two are formed by the 

 torrents descending the western face of the Blue mountains, 

 and, in their progress to the interior, diverge, near the 149th 

 meridian, — the Lachlan stretching to the north-west, and the 

 Macquarrie pursuing a more northerly course. Both are 

 large rivers, — the Macquarrie being sometimes capable of 

 floating a ship of the line, within one hundred miles of its 

 source. The Lachlan is more than twelve hundred miles in 

 length, and the Macquarrie from seven to eight hundred. 

 The Morrumbidgee rises in the Warragongs, and after run- 

 ning a tortuous westerly course, for not less than one thou- 

 sand miles, joins the Murray in latitude 34° 45' S. and Ion- 



