SPLENDID VIEW FROM KOSCIUSKO 59 



some of the gullies which score the sides of Kosciusko, but 

 none of them form falls of any great height or volume ; 

 and none roll over the most precipitous cliffs. 



In no part of Australia are there waterfalls to compare 

 in volume and grandeur with those of other continents ; 

 but many of those that do exist are remarkable for their 

 great beauty. Some descend many hundreds of feet into 

 gloomy chasms, which are too narrow and confined to be 

 correctly described as valleys, and yet have scarcely 

 volume enough to weigh against the strong mountain winds, 

 which often blow them into remarkable looking veils of 

 spray. Some, indeed, are beaten, by successive dashings 

 against the rock, into spray so fine that they only reach 

 the gully a thousand feet below as a shower of rain. In 

 summer these cascades dry up entirely and cease to be 

 until the winter rains renew their babbling lives. 



The melting of the snow on the tops of those peaks of 

 the Australian Alps where it finds a lodgment for a few 

 months in each year, must and does form torrents ; but 

 these are never of any great size or force; and on 

 Kosciusko the torrents all run in the direction of the 

 lesser slopes of the mountain. Occasionally they fall a 

 few feet into gullies, making charming scenes on a small 

 scale ; but these are so hidden ^by thick forest and 

 masses of a bamboo-like shrub that it is only rarely that 

 a good view of them can be obtained. Speaking con- 

 jecturally, I should say that there is not a cascade in the 

 mountain that discharges more than a dozen tons of water 

 per minute; and in the dry weather probably all are 

 exhausted for a time ; or, at most, trickle over the rocks 

 as runnels. 



Among the broken rocks at the bases of the Alps 

 wallaby are numerous — I should say except where the 

 colonists have nearly exterminated them — but they do 

 not ascend the mountains to any great height. I have 

 never seen any at a greater elevation than twelve or 

 fourteen hundred feet. 



But it is, probably, the smaller " native cats," " native 

 mice," etc., that are the most interesting mammals of these 



