Coal Basin of New South Wales. 3 
Rocks, and literally in the region of wayside public-houses, 
innumerable teams of weary horses, harrenness, bad roads, 
and bushrangers. I am not going to describe the forty miles 
of turnpike—for such it was—thus gone over, although, 
from the quantity of sand everywhere, the description might 
prove not altogether impertinent to such a paper; and 
although the time of traversing the same occupied ten hours, 
or as I believed at the period rather more than double that 
number of geological epochs of your explorer’s life. And all 
this time was one incessant series of jolts and tumbles, 
varied sometimes by the coach standing as I fancied on its 
head and at others turning a somerset. I think I left much 
as Philip Vanderdecken may probably feel when he has 
vainly essayed doubling the Cape until he sees the South 
Pacific gradually dry into another Sahara, that all the while 
causesdhim to pitch and toss for ever over waves of sand, 
for the road everywhere was sand and nothing else, and 
over ridges of this like waves, and down into valley-like 
hollows, we surged and tumbled through the hours, or 
through the epoch, until gladdened by the sight of the 
Valley of Hartley at break of day. 
This valley, as is the case with all other valleys of the 
district, is of a most interesting character. There is a tolerably 
level portion at the bottom, mostly thickly timbered, then a 
steep slope covered by gigantic trees, above which the upper 
portion of the valley’s side is seen to rise in an almost per- 
pendicular wall of rock, which often runs on in an almost 
unbroken line for many miles. Along the top of this wall- 
like conformation there is almost a continuous level super- 
ficies ; but this although of tolerably even surface is of ex- 
ceedingly irregular outline. There are tongues of land that 
run out into the valleys like promontories, and narrow necks 
that seem as it were isthmuses. Anon and you see a de- 
tached hill with its level top also looking like an island, or 
the valiey opens into a wide-spread gulf with branching arms 
of the most fantastic shape. Raise Sydney Harbour and the 
- Parramatta River into dry land and you will have one of the 
valleys described, or sink the valley so that it may be flooded 
with sea water, and straightway you will have an exagge- 
rated representation of one and all of the romantic inlets of 
the eastern coast. } 
The shore line from Sydney to Newcastle is, for the most 
part, wild and rugged, and is fringed with one or two 
romantic-looking rocky islands, lying a mile or two out to 
B 2 
