136 



A USTRALASIA ILL USTRA TED. 



tions and only the beds of the water-courses indicate the fall of the land. In many 

 parts the soil is rich, but the rainfall is so precarious that a carpet of green is the 

 exception and not the rule, the vegetation being principally salt-bush. Kendall, in some 

 graphic verses, has well described the summer aspect of these arid stretches of sun- 

 scorched soil : 



Swarthy wastelands, wide and woodless, glittering miles and miles away. 

 Where the south wind seldom wanders, and the winters will not stay ; 

 Lurid wastelands, pent in silence thick with hot and thirsty sighs, 

 Where the scanty thorn-leaves twinkle with their haggard hopeless eyes ; 

 Furnaced wastelands, hunched with hillocks like to stony billows rolled 

 Where the naked flats lie swirling, like a sea of darkened gold ; 

 Burning wastelands, glancing upward with a weird and vacant stare, 

 Where the languid heavens quiver o'er red depths of stirless air ! 



SANDSTONE PEAKS OF THE FAR WEST. 



RIVERS. 



The river system of New South 

 Wales divides itself naturally into two 

 parts, namely, the eastern and western 

 flowing waters. All the rivers take 

 their rise in some part of the great 

 cordillera range, which runs roughly 

 parallel with the coast, though at a 

 distance varying from thirty to one 

 hundred and fifty miles. Throughout 

 its whole length this range constitutes 

 the Big Divide, the water falling on 



its eastern slope flowing to the sea, and that on the western side going into the Murray. 

 The division of the colony thus made is very unequal in area, three-fourths of it lying 

 to the west of the main range. The whole of the surplus rainfall on the inland area 

 drains into the Murray at Wentworth, the principal tributaries of this main artery being 



A SANDSTONE TABLE-LAND. 



