86 NEW ENGLAND (n.S.W.) ETC. 



time in the afternoon, I was led four or five miles out of my 

 way and into an exceptionally rough and stony piece of country 

 on the Macdonald River, above Bendemeer, However, I got 

 away from the stones without laming my horse, and reached 

 the hotel about sunset. Next morning I took the road towards 

 Tamworth, but before reaching the top of the Moonby range 

 turned into a bridle track to the right as directed. Such a weird 

 country it was too. The track was easy to follow ; its course 

 was along the crown of a very steep spur, on either side of 

 which the hillside sloped so precipitously that no other track 

 could be formed. Big trees and monster granite rocks are 

 abundant all over the Moonby, not a few enormous boulders 

 sitting securely on small stones not larger than a good-sized 

 ( hair. There is something fascinating about these lonely 

 wilderness ranges, but to make a practicable road through them 

 would cost many thousands of pounds. 



Turning northwards we find equally broken and steep ranges 

 dividing the western and more level country from the coast ; 

 indeed the mountain range which forms the eastern boundary of 

 the New England district is a part of the main range of the country. 

 In different places rough bridle tracks had been formed by settlers 

 whose business took them coastwise on their sure-footed moun- 

 tain horses. These, however, are notes of travel, not descriptions 

 of places with which I have no personal acquaintance, and I will 

 pass over the tracks which I never followed as well as those 

 which have been made at more or less cost in later years. A few 

 months after I arrived on New England I made my first visit to 

 Armidale, and the trip was to me perhaps more full of interest 

 because the manner of it was free from any any shadow of con- 

 ventionality. I went with our dray in the capacity of bullock- 

 driver's offsider. At that time we grew wheat at each station 

 and had it ground at the nearest mill. This arrangement arose 

 out of the difficulty of carriage and the frequent depreciation of 

 flour through its becoming damp during the long trips of drays 

 from the coast. When .John Robertson's Land Act, with its 

 free selection provisions, came into operation, enough settlers 

 took up land in the district to supply our wants in this respect. 

 However, having loaded up with wheat, we started off one morn- 

 ing on our thirty-mile trip, I riding a quiet old horse who quite 

 understood that his business was to stand anywhere he was left 

 until he was wanted, and at night he must never take the horse- 

 bell he then wore beyond our hearing from the camp. My busi- 



