THE CITY OF SYDNEY. 157 



therefore, has this special peculiarity as a watering-place that it is a Harbour-side and 

 a sea-side village all in one, and in a walk of a few minutes the visitor can pass from 

 a land-locked sheet of water, smooth and transparent as a lake, to the ocean Leach, 

 fretted with the long roll of the Pacific. Standing on a magnificent and commanding site 

 on the north-east point of the North Head is the Cardinal's palace, and by its side a 

 Roman Catholic seminary. The village of Manly, which originally nestled on the flats, 

 is now creeping up the heights, and the line of cottages is extending all along the 

 road to Middle Harbour. Of all the water-side resorts Manly is the most frequented. 

 Well-appointed steamers maintain a constant communication with the city. Many 

 merchants have their homes here, while the tired workers from the town flock down 

 on holidays to loll and stroll upon the beach and to fill their lungs with the fresh sea 

 breeze. In summer time the beach is a promenade, gay with colour and vocal with the 

 laughter of children. But the great file of the village is the wild-flower show which 

 takes place in the month of September, and which has now become an institution. It 

 had its origin in an effort to pay off a church debt a happy . inspiration suggesting it 

 as an improvement on the ordinary bazaar. Flowers fill all the bush about Manly in 

 the spring. Heath-like epacrids of many varieties carpet the table-lands ; wattles of 

 various shades of yellow bloom in the scrub on the fiats and fill the air with their 

 fragrant perfume ; waratahs or native tulips shine in their crimson beauty like cones of 

 fire in the gullies ; the aromatic native roses and other boroncas grow in profusion ; 

 the gold and silver stars of Bethlehem lie thickly tufted on the ground, and on many 

 rocky faces of the coast-ravines are beautiful orchids called rock-lilies. The suggestion 

 was to blend these beauties of the bush together. The idea was eagerly taken up, and 

 was by tasteful hands made a reality. The old pavilion in the little park was trans- 

 formed into a gay green bower, in which flowers and ferns were artistically interwoven ; 

 palms took the place of ordinary pillars ; the berries of the bush made harmonies with 

 dark-green leaves ; fountains plashed and cascades danced over mimic falls and grottoes, 

 which in the . evening were illuminated by a well-directed play of the electric beam. The 

 fairy-scene became an immense attraction, and the flowers paid the church debt. 



Coasting from Manly up the Harbour the first great headland passed is Dobroyd, 

 a bold cliff exposed to the full force of south-easterly gales. The navigation here for 

 small craft is somewhat dangerous, for at times the Bumborah rises suddenly when the 

 groundswell from the ocean touches the ledge of rocks that reaches out from the foot 

 of the cliff, and the slow-rolling wave becomes then an angry breaker, which has brought 

 disaster on many a boat's unwary crew. After rounding Dobroyd the entrance into 

 Middle Harbour opens out. This is a long many-armed estuary stretching from the 

 entrance fully five miles into the heart of the hills. The weather side of this entrance 

 is exposed to the sea rolling in from the Heads, but the eastern side is protected, and 

 here, on the tranquil shore, holiday-seekers by the thousand are landed, for at the foot 

 of the rocky hill spreads out a large well-grassed flat and a smooth white beach that 

 seem made by Nature for picnics. So roomy a playground, and one so easily 

 accessible, does not often lie close to a great city. Opposite Clontarf runs out a long 

 sand-spit, making a natural breakwater and narrowing the channel. Between its point 

 and the opposite shore is a punt, which forms a connecting link in the overland route 



