8 
ROCKHAMPTON 
CHAP. 
We drove first to the Crescent lagoon, two miles 
away, on the top of the Athelstone Range, where 
the water is pumped into an artificial reservoir to 
supply the town, then round about the streets, which 
are broad and well planted with trees. The town is 
flat and lies very low, and I am glad that my visit is 
in spring instead of in the summer, for the crisp air 
now is just warm enough to be pleasant and the sky 
absolutely cloudless. We bought books, sugar-plums, 
and papers, and I dined in the evening with Mrs. P., 
whose husband is lucky enough to own many thousands 
of shares in the Mount Morgan Mine. Of course I 
went to see it ; who does not ? and thoroughly enjoyed 
the twenty-five-mile drive, notwithstanding the rough- 
ness of the road ; for the last nine miles it was very 
break-neck work, and our leader (we had three horses) 
had a pleasant way of turning round and facing us just 
at the most critical moments, to see how we were taking 
things. We were taking them very badly ; for Mrs. P., 
who kindly drove me there, was even more nervous 
than I was. At the Razorback Hill we came upon the 
body of a smashed coach, then a pair of wheels, and 
finally the top part of the “ Royal Mail Coach ” itself. 
The drive from the railway station — eight miles — is 
generally taken in this coach, and we heartily con- 
gratulated ourselves that we had not joined it that time. 
We passed more and larger teams of horses and 
bullocks than I had ever seen before. Driving the former 
seems warranted to produce more strong language than 
any other occupation going, judging from the snatches 
that we quickly got in passing. Twenty-eight bullocks 
or seventeen or eighteen horses were not unusual numbers 
in one team. The sight of a mob of wild cattle farther 
on crossing a swollen stream, the roaring and bellowing, 
the tossing forest of horns above the heaving mass of 
