AND ON THE SLOPES OF SMITH S CREEK. 119 



neatness, and attention to details, and signs of capital, 

 and of assiduous industry, were not seen ; but the sub 

 jection of apparently difficult nature was visible, as it 

 may be seen on the Scottish Borders, or on the flanks of 

 the Lammermuir hills, or of the more lofty Grampians 

 in the valley of Strathmore. 



It is similar land that gives rise to such similar appear 

 ances in different and dissimilar countries, where the 

 people is the same. We were again on the flanks of 

 hills of red conglomerate, which, by their crumbling, 

 formed soils so dry, fertile, and easy to work, as to tempt 

 the husbandman from the more difficult though leveler 

 plain, higher and higher up the hills, with his axe and 

 his team, every year that passed. So much is man the 

 creature of material circumstances, so similar is his con 

 duct, where natural phenomena are the same ; and so 

 possible is it to predict in a new country, from the trees 

 and rocks that cover it, where men will first settle, how 

 they will first plant and sow, in what directions their 

 culture will proceed, where the plains will be preferred 

 by the cultivator, and where he will rather brave the 

 adventure of subduing the loftier hills. 



As we approached the mouth of the river, where it 

 opens out into the wider vale of Sussex, the red conglo 

 merate hills on either hand became loftier, and presented 

 those rounded tops and steep sides which characterise 

 these rocks in nearly all countries. But the infancy of 

 civilisation is shown by the deficient topographical 

 nomenclature. Beautiful mountains, which one would 

 naturally like to fix in one s memory by the help of a 

 name, arc here still unnamed, so that one can neither tell 

 in conversation where one has been, nor even point out 

 on the map the particular spots on which we have looked 

 with the highest interest. One striking hill only in all 

 this valley of Smith s Creek has been distinguished by a 

 name. It has been called Mount Pisgah ; and that no 



