17'88.] OF NEW SOUTH WALES. s 7 



he fet off with a fmall party, intending if poffible to reach them, taking 

 with him fix days' provifions ; but he returned without attaining either 

 objecl: of his journey,— the mountains, or a river. 



He penetrated about thirty miles inland, through a country mod: 

 amply clothed with timber, but in general free from underwood. On 

 the fifth day of his excurfion, he caught, from a rifing ground which 

 he named Belle Vue, the only glance of the mountains which he ob- 

 tained during the journey; and as they then appeared at too great a 

 diftance to be reached on one day's allowance of provifions, which 

 was all they had left, he determined to return to Sydney Cove. 

 i In Port Jackfon 'another branch extending to the northward had 



been difcovered ; but as the country furrounding it was high, rocky, 

 and barren, though it might add to the extent and beauty of the har- 

 bour, it did not promife to be of any benefit to the fettlement. 



The governor had the mortification to learn on his return from his 

 weftern expedition, that five ewes and a lamb had been deftroyed at a 

 farm in the adjoining Cove, fuppofed to have been killed by dogs be- 

 longing to the natives. This to the happy inhabitants of Great Bri- 

 tain may appear a circumftance too trivial to record ; but to thefe 

 founders of a new world it was of magnitude fufficient to be by them 

 deemed a public calamity ; fo much do fituations exalt or diminifh the 

 importance of circumftances ! 



The number of fheep that were landed in this country had been 

 confiderably lelfened; they were of neceffity placed on ground, and 

 compelled to feed on grafs, that had never before been expofed to air 

 or fun, and which confequently did not agree with them ; a circum- 

 ftance much to be lamented ; as without ftock the fettlement mull for 

 years remain dependent on the mother-country for the means of fub^ 

 fiftence. 



The month of May opened with the trial, conviction, and execu- 

 tion of James Bennetr, a youth of feventeen years of age, for break- 

 ing open and robbing a tent. He confefled that he had often merited 

 death before he committed the crime for which he was then about to 



E 2 fuffer, 



