TASMANIA. 



147 



or fifteen years ago very few men visited that district, and even now nobody 

 goes there unless impelled by strong business reasons. When you stand on 

 Mount Bischoff and look across the hills which rise in this wild region, you 

 are presented with a grand spectacle, and you wonder if the day can ever 

 come when clearings and cultivation will be where now the bush appears to 

 be impenetrable. 



From Launceston, in an easterly direction, the traveller finds much to 

 interest him, particularly in that quarter where stand Ben Lomond and other 





Views in Tasmania. 



mountains, each upwards of 5000 feet high. St. Mary's Pass is a natural 

 gateway through the ranges, and the coaches which traverse the road 

 rattle along alarming ridges ; but pleasure and surprise are so strongly excited 

 that there is no time for a thought of danger. Through to Fingal, and on 

 to St. Helen's at George's Bay, on the east coast, the variations of scene are 

 endless. And then the cliffs are reached ; and, gazing on the broad blue 

 ocean once more, it is vividly brought home to the continental Australian that 

 he is on an island, and a beautiful island also. Tin and gold mines have 

 been worked in this division of the colony more or less successfully ; but the 



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