114 
"We passed throiigli clumps of magnificent palms, 20 feet to 
30 feet in height, each tree shading a circle 20 feet to 30 feet in 
diameter, the ground beneath bare of all vegetation, and strewn with 
a soft carpet of dead leaves. About midday we found a wallaby- 
skeleton , with bones complete. ConcerDing these osteological remains, 
Mr. de Vis remarks — " A padymelon, allied to Halmaturus tJietediSy 
from which, however, it differs considerably, possibly an undescribed 
species." Heaven only knows how a wallaby ever found his way to 
that locality. He must have sighed for a lodge in some v.ast 
wilderness, some boundless contiguity of shade, where myalls cease 
from troubling and wallabies are at rest. He was evidently a lost 
wallaby, driven there by dingoes, or wandered from the forest spurs 
on the sides of the ranges. In my official report is the following 
passage: — " At noon we were on the head of the Little Mulgrave and 
[Freshwater Creek, on a mountain 3,000 feet high, commanding a 
complete view of a vast expanse of country. It may be well to 
mention here that when Christie Palmerston was across there about 
three years ago, looking for a railway track at the request of the 
Government, he reported the discovery of 30,000 acres of ' grand 
country' on the head of Freshwater Creek, and induced the Minister 
for Lands to reserve that area. It is my duty to report here that 
these 30,000 acres of ' grand country' exist nowhere outside of 
Palmerston's imagination. The heads of Freshwater Creek, the 
Clohesy, and Little Mulgrave rise in rough broken ranges and deep 
rocky gorges, and there is not 100 acres of level or available country 
on one of them." 
The site of Palmerston's valuable 30,000 acres is occupied by 
useless mountains suitable only for goats and rock wallabies. He 
made the same error as the highly imaginative New Gruinea explorer, 
who examined that country from the deck of a cutter, and located a bogus 
mountain 38,000 feet high on what is known now to be a swamp- 
covered plain. 
That night we camped at 3,100 feet, on a thickly timbered peak, 
lonely enough to satisfy the saddest mortal who ever longed to retire 
from this earth, and hide his 
Abandoned hope and love that turns to hate, 
And self-contempt, bitterer to drink than blood, 
in beautiful, but unsympathetic, Nature's dark and remotest solitudes ! 
The ground being all wet we cut down the ferns and made 
couches, more expensive than any occupied by modern kings or queens. 
Bailey estimated the London value of the ferns cut down in the ascent 
of Wooroonooran at £5,000 ! In twenty minutes on that peak we 
destroyed plants that no money value would represent if growing in 
the botanical gardens of Europe or the conservatories of the millionaires 
of Britain. We carried no tent, only a strong calico fly sufficient to 
cover us all in wet weather. One blaekboy slept at my back, one at 
my feet, and one between me and the fire ; Harold lying across beside 
my head. Temperature at night, 58 degrees ; midday shade, 72 degrees. 
During the day, while on the top of a mountain at 3,200 feet, I was 
fortunate enough to discover the first nest and egg of Prionodura 
(Meston's Bower Bird), the bird with the golden collar and golden 
crest. The female flew off the nest, which was built in the fork of a 
small tree, about 7 feet from the ground. It was a cup-shaped open 
