56 A NATURALIST IN TASMANIA ch. 



south-western Tasmania to the coast. These 

 mountains, except in the extreme west, are all 

 of greenstone, and form the broken southern 

 continuation of the great central greenstone 

 plateau of the island. On some of the peaks, 

 for instance Adamson's Peak and Mount Field, 

 snow is rarely altogether absent even far into 

 the summer, and the whole inland district, south 

 of a line drawn from Mount Wellington to the 

 west coast, is one of the wildest and least in- 

 habited in Australia. Owing to the heavy rain- 

 fall the mountains are clothed with dense forest, 

 whose impenetrable underscrub can only be 

 traversed by painfully cutting a track with the 

 axe ; tracks so cut are completely obliterated by 

 fallen timber and undergrowth in the course of 

 a few months ; and at all times of the year the 

 traveller may be overtaken by the rigour of the 

 Antarctic blizzards, which sweep over these ex- 

 posed ranges with deadly suddenness. None 

 but experienced bushmen could venture with 

 impunity far into these inhospitable regions, and 

 many of the most experienced have lost their 

 lives there. On several occasions vessels have 

 been wrecked upon the south-west coast, and 

 the shipwrecked crew on attaining to land and 

 the hope of safety have attempted to strike into 

 the bush in search of succour, only to perish 

 miserably of starvation and exposure with all the 

 attendant horrors or suspicions of foul play. 

 And yet the whole district is only the size of an 



