140 



A USTRALASIA ILL USTRA TED. 



crosses it just about the point which divides the river proper from the estuary. Bold 

 cliffs rise three hundred feet from the water's edge, their faces of weather-worn sand- 

 stone displaying countless tints of red and brown ; and great hills, timbered from base 

 to summit, tower above, and are reproduced in the perfect mirror of the water below. 

 Reeds grow freely upon any bit of swampy fore-shore, and when a little patch of 

 alluvial soil has been so far built up as to harden and become sweet, the corn shoots 

 tall and fair ; and at evening or morning, or at any hour of a bright winter's day, 

 there is a beauty about the narrowing estuary which pen and pencil seek in vain to 

 depict. The beauty of form, the graceful lines of the hills, the long water-tongue 

 stretching out into the sea, the artist may depict ; but who can paint the soft raiment 

 of atmosphere that finest of all textures woven by Nature out of cloud and river mist, 



the soft, intangible film that 

 beautifies all the crown and 

 front of the mountain, as a 

 smile illumines the human 

 face the violet lights, the 

 purple shadows, the bands 

 of emerald below and the 

 shield of sapphire above, the 

 river of gold that seems to 

 roll out of the setting sun, 

 and to flood all valleys and 

 crown all hill-tops with every 

 dying day ? 



Forty miles to the north 

 of the Hawkesbury is the 

 mouth of the Hunter a 

 river which drains eight 

 thousand square miles, and 

 which is navigable as far as 

 Morpeth, thirty miles inland. 

 The great coal-shipping port 

 of Newcastle lies just inside 

 the entrance. On both sides 

 of the river the immediate 

 country is tlat, and nearly 

 all the way to Morpeth may 

 be seen rich lucerne pad- 

 docks, yielding six crops a year, which make of this district the great hay-field of Sydney. 

 This rich soil is the result of the alluvial deposit of centuries, and the ground is still 

 from time to time enriched by floods. Above Maitlancl the river is tapped for the 

 water-supply of all the townships between that point and the sea, and a quarter of a 

 million sterling has already been expended in carrying out the necessary work of storage 

 and distribution. The valley of the Upper Hunter is more undulating, but still richly- 



THE XEPEAX NEAR 1'EXKITH. 



