ITS IMPROVEMENT 



53 



also for the dessert ; and we may hope that the 

 time is not distant when grapes will abound in 

 Australia as they at present do at the Cape, and 

 that wine both for home-consumption and ex- 

 portation will be made from them. The immense 

 increase of grapes in the colony during the last 

 two or three years, leads one to suppose that the 

 above opinion will speedily be confirmed. 



On making a circuit around the town of 

 Sydney, the metropolis of the Australian colony, 

 the extent of ground it occupies, the number of 

 buildings completed, as well as those erecting for 

 the increased and still increasing population, the 

 variety and neatness of the shops, excite the sur- 

 prise of a stranger, and still more of a person who 

 revisits the town after a brief absence, at the rapid 

 improvements that have taken place in this dis- 

 tant colony in so short a period of time. The hum- 

 ble wooden dwellings are fast giving place to neat 

 houses and cottages constructed of brick or sand- 

 stone ; but, as may be expected in all recently 

 established towns, there is much want of sym- 

 metry in the construction of the buildings ; and 

 on perambulating the streets, specimens of se- 

 veral unknown orders of architecture are seen ; 

 the cottage style, with neat verandas, is one 

 much adopted for private dwellings, and has a 

 neatness of external appearance, with which the 



