276 NEW SOUTH WALES. 



of the colony, and was the best met with. This was another instance 

 of the good character, general deportment, and temperate habits of 

 this class, who, in spite of their unhappy parentage, evil example, 

 and inauspicious connexions, offer a remarkable example of the 

 improvement which education, when aided by a change of condition, 

 may effect in a single generation. 



The stopping-places for the next two days were the huts of stock- 

 men, and dwellings of settlers, all of which resembled each other in 

 their construction. The sides were made of slabs of wood placed 

 upright in the earth, and were sometimes fastened to a frame ; the 

 roof was composed of strips of the bark of the gum tree. In the better 

 sort of houses there were chimneys of brick, and glazed windows ; 

 but these were comparatively few ; and in the others an elevated 

 hearth of clay, in a recess of the hut, supplied the former, the smoke 

 escaping through the roof. A cupboard, a camp bedstead, a rude 

 table, with a few stools, supplied the want of furniture. In houses of 

 this description, were living gentlemen of education and refined 

 habits, who were submitting to a few years of hardship and banish- 

 ment from social life, in hopes of realizing rapid fortunes. 



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On the 18th, Wellington Valley was reached. It is a beautiful 

 plain, about four miles square, bounded by low hills, and watered 



