COMMUNICATED BY HON. A. NORTON, M.L.C. 99 



kind and grown at all seasons of the year, which shows how fine 

 the climate is. 



" The next morning, Friday, 12th April, we reloaded. Sir 

 John came to see us off and presented us with a quarter of mut- 

 ton, a couple of fowls, and some butter. I had now before me 

 this most tremendous journey. I was told I deserved to be im- 

 mortalised for the attempt, and the Government could not do too 

 much for us for taking a family to a settlement where no family 

 had gone before. 1 mean no family of free settlers, and very 

 few others. Everything that could be done for us was done by 

 the officers to make it as comfortable as possible. 



" In addition to our luggage we had to take corn for the 

 cattle, as in the mountains there is not sufficient grass for them, 

 and provisions necessary for ourselves and the nine men who 

 accompanied us ; in consequence of this we were obliged to leave 

 many things behind. 



" We now commenced with two drays with five bullocks, 

 and one dray with four horses, and our own cart with two ; 

 they had no more carts to give us. Amidst the good 

 wishes of all, not excepting a party of natives who had come to 

 bid us farewell, we commenced our journey. We had not pro- 

 ceeded more than a quarter of a mile before we came to a small 

 stream of water, with sandy bottom and banks. Here the 

 second dray with the bullocks sank. The storekeeper, superin- 

 tendent, and overseer from Emu Plains, witnessing our stoppage, 

 came to our assistance. The two latter did not leave us until 

 night. It employed us an hour to extricate the dray, and this 

 was not accomplished without the horses of the other being- 

 added to it. We now proceeded about a quarter of a mile further ; 

 and now imagine me at the foot of the tremendous mountains, 

 the difficulty of passing which is, I suppose, as great as or greater 

 than any known road in the world, not from the badness of the 

 road, which has been entirely made and which is hard all the 

 way, so much as from the extreme steepness of the ascent and 

 descent. For forty miles the hills are barren of herbage for 

 cattle, but as far as the eye can reach, even to the summit of the 

 highest, every hill and dale is covered with wood, lofty trees and 

 small shrubs, many of them blooming with delicate flowers, the 

 colours so beautiful that even the highest circles of England 

 would prize them. These mountains appear to be solid rock, 

 with hardly any earth upon the surface. This land seems as if 

 it was never intended for human beings to inhabit. There are 



