Discoveries in Australia Volume I Part 24

William Town consisted, at that time, of only a few houses. One disadvantage under which this place labours is badness of water, while the country around it is a dead level, with clumps of very open woodland.

The formation is whinstone, but the soil's fertile quality shows an absence of sandstone.

RIVER YARRA-YARRA.

Proceeding up the Yarra-yarra, we found that about two miles from the mouth, the river divides, one branch continuing in a northerly direction, and the other, a narrow sluggish stream, turning suddenly off to the eastward. The banks are so densely wooded, that it is seldom if ever that its surface is ruffled by a breeze.

MELBOURNE.

The township of Melbourne on its north bank, five miles from the river's mouth, we found a very bustling place. Nearly two thousand persons had already congregated there, and more were arriving every day, so that great speculation was going on in land. We were delighted with the park-like appearance of the country, and the rich quality of the soil.

This was the most fertile district we had seen in all Australia; and I believe everyone allows that such is the case. Its reputation indeed was at one time so great, that it became the point of attraction for all settlers from the mother country, where at one time the rage for Port Phillip became such, that there existed scarcely a village in which some of the inhabitants, collecting their little all, did not set out for this land of promise, with the hope of rapidly making a fortune and returning to end their days in comfort at home. Everyone I think must leave with such hopes; for who can deliberately gather up his goods and go into a far country with the settled intention of never returning?

A rocky ledge extends across the river fronting the town, upon which the plan had been formed of erecting a dam for the purpose of keeping the water fresh; whereas now the river is salt above the town, and the well water is not particularly good. The Yarra-yarra is not navigable even for boats many miles beyond Melbourne, on account of the numerous falls. Some of the reaches above the town are very picturesque--still gla.s.sy sheets of water stretch between steep banks clothed with rich vegetation down to the very edge of the stream--the branches of the trees droop over the smooth surface, and are vividly reflected; and substance is so perfectly blended with shadow, that it is impossible to detect where they unite.

At the western extremity of Melbourne is a low round hill, fifty-seven feet above the level of the sea by our observations, and about thirty above the town. There are now none of the aborigines in the neighbourhood of Melbourne; but I learned that some of their old men remember the time when the site of the town was under water, in consequence of one of those sudden inundations that happen in Australia, and are so much in keeping with the other strange things that occur there.

SINGULAR CUSTOM.

Having alluded to the natives, I may here mention a singular custom that came under notice some time after, at the Protectorate in the valley of the Loddon, in the vicinity of Melbourne. Several women were observed having their faces completely concealed by their opossum-skin mantles.

Not satisfied with this moreover, in pa.s.sing a party of men, they moved in a sidelong manner, so as to render it impossible, even if the covering came to be displaced, that their faces should be seen. In the evening at the Corobbery, these persons, three in number, were seated in the circle of women, so as to have their backs turned to the dancers or actors, their faces still being wholly concealed. They remained seated, motionless, taking no part in the singing or the gestures of encouragement indulged in by the other women. It was subsequently explained by a protector, that these were women who had daughters betrothed to the men of their tribe, and that during the period of betrothment the mothers are always thus rigidly veiled.

Near Mount Macedon, thirty miles North-West from Melbourne, there has been discovered, I was informed, a quarry of marble of a very fine quality; and in the same neighbourhood is an extinct crater. The formation at and in the immediate vicinity of Melbourne, is of tertiary deposits a.s.sociated with arenaceous older rocks.

We returned to the ships by a short route leading direct from Melbourne to the northern sh.o.r.e of Hobson's Bay. During the walk I was much struck with the great risk that people run in selecting land from a map of this country, half of our road lying over a rich loam, and the other half over soft sand. The trees swarmed with large locusts (the cicada) quite deafening us with their shrill buzzing noise.

MANNA.

We found the branches of these trees and the ground underneath strewed over with a white substance resembling small flakes of snow, called by the colonists manna. I am aware that an erroneous idea exists that this matter is deposited by the locusts; but in fact it is an exudation from the Eucalyptus; and although I saw it beneath another kind of tree, it must have been carried there by the wind. A different sort, of a pale yellow colour, is found on a smaller species of Eucalyptus growing on highlands, and is much sought after for food by the natives, who sometimes sc.r.a.pe from the tree as much as a pound in a quarter of an hour. It has the taste of a delicious sweetmeat, with an almond flavour, and is so luscious that much cannot be eaten of it. This is well worthy of attention from our confectioners at home, and it may hereafter form an article of commerce, although from what has fallen under my own observation, and from what I have learnt from Mr. Eyre and others, I should say it is not of frequent occurrence. The first kind, being found strewed underneath the tree probably exudes from the leaf, whilst the second oozes from the stem. The wood of the latter is much used for fuel by the natives, especially in night-fishing, and burns brightly, without smoke, diffusing also a delicious aromatic smell.

HOBSON'S BAY.

On Christmas day, which we spent in Hobson's Bay, we experienced one of those hot winds which occasionally occur coming off the land. During its prevalence, everything a.s.sumes a strange appearance--objects are seen with difficulty, and acquire a tremulous motion like that which is imparted to everything seen through the air escaping from an over-heated stove. The thermometer on a wall under the glare of the sun, stood at 135 degrees.

We surveyed Hobson's Bay during our stay, and connected it by triangulation with Melbourne. Our observations were made at the inner end of a small jetty. The mouth of the Yarra-yarra is closed up by a bar, which from its soft muddy nature may be easily removed. The deepest water we found on it at high tide was nine feet.

CORIO HARBOUR.

Having completed our operations, we next morning, January 1st, 1839, departed for Corio Harbour, situated at the head of a deep inlet midway on the western sh.o.r.e of Port Phillip. We found our progress impeded as we beat up it by a long spit, extending two thirds of the way across from a low projecting point lying midway on the north sh.o.r.e. On the opposite side, the land is of moderate elevation, and has in many places a most inviting rich park-like appearance, swelling on all sides into gra.s.sy downs, with patches of open woodland interspersed. In the afternoon we anch.o.r.ed in three fathoms, about a quarter of a mile from the south point of Corio Harbour. This is a level expanse of land named Point Henry, from which a long spit extends, leaving only a shoal channel between it and the northern sh.o.r.e. Thus, though the harbour has apparently a broad open mouth, it is impossible for a large vessel to enter it.

January 2.

After breakfast a party of us went to visit Captain Fyans, the police magistrate of the district, for the purpose of arranging a trip to Station Peak. We landed on the South-West corner of Corio Harbour, where we found four fathoms close to the beach, immediately over which is the north end of the township of Geelong. A kind of store and two other wooden buildings pointed out its locality. Captain Fyans was living in a log-hut on the banks of the Marabul River. Our road thither lay west about three miles across a woody down.

RIVER BARWON.

The Marabul runs to the southward, and joins the Barwon flowing from the west; after which the united streams take a south-easterly direction. The course of the latter I was anxious to trace, having seen its mouth in pa.s.sing along the coast west from Port Phillip. Very opportunely I met with Mr. Smith, belonging to the colonial surveying department, who being employed in the neighbourhood, took me to a commanding station on some low hills about three miles to the south, called by the natives Barabul.

We crossed the Barwon running to the south-east at the foot of them, near where it fell some height over a rocky shelf forming a pretty waterfall.

Turning to the left from this roar of water, you find the stream meandering silently between rich gra.s.sy flats. On one of these Mr.

Smith's tents were pitched, overlooked by a craggy height on the opposite side of the river; and the blue stream of smoke that arose from the fire of his party, helped to impart life and beauty to the scene. From the Barabul hills I almost traced the Barwon to its confluence with the sea.

Five miles to the south-east from where we stood it communicated with a large lagoon; after leaving which, I was informed there was only a depth of three feet, and a width of one eighth of a mile. It is not, however, this alone that renders the Barwon useless for water-carriage to the town of Geelong; for the exposed situation of its mouth almost always prevents boats from entering.

The singular sloping treeless sides of the Barabul hills, and the declivities of the valley of the Marabul river, bear a striking resemblance to many parts of Eastern Patagonia. They appear as if they had just emerged from the sea, which had as it were scooped out their hollows and smoothed their sides. A remarkable high round hill, perfectly bare of trees, and called by the natives Moriac, bore West 1/2 South six miles from where we stood. On our return we met some of the natives; they were the first I had seen of the aborigines of this part of the continent, and were certainly a finer race than the people on the western coasts. They complained of the white men bringing animals into their country that scare away the kangaroo, and destroy the roots which at certain seasons of the year form part of their sustenance. This, Mr.

Smith told me, was a very general complaint.

I spent a very pleasant evening at Captain Fyans' comfortable quarters, in the course of which arrangements were made for next day's journey to Station Peak, Mr. Smith kindly offering to lend me a horse and to accompany me.

STATION PEAK.

January 3.

We started for Station Peak very early. The morning air had a delightfully bracing effect; and the gra.s.s glittered with a copious fall of dew. The first five miles of road lay over a high down, with pretty patches of woodland interspersed; and the remaining ten over a low plain that stretches to the foot of the peak. Six miles from the latter we crossed a hollow where I noticed some calcareous matter, in which were included sh.e.l.ls of recent species, evidently showing that an upheaval had taken place in this part of the continent. We saw on the plain several large bustards resembling a light brown domestic turkey.

Leaving our horses at the foot of the peak, we ascended it by a sloping ridge on the south-east face. Huge blocks of granite--some poised on a point as if the slightest touch would send them rolling and thundering to the plains below--covered the sides and summits of this and the smaller peak, to the north of which are several others scattered over about a mile of ground.

On reaching the summit, I hastened to a pile of stones which Captain Flinders had erected to commemorate his visit; but, alas, the bottle and paper left by him were gone, and I have not since been able to learn who it was that took away this interesting and valuable record.

VIEW FROM STATION PEAK.

The view commanded all points of the splendid sheet of water called Port Phillip, which stretched away its shining expanse seemingly almost from our very feet; whilst north-east two long wavy lines of trees showed the course of the Little and Weariby rivers meandering through the plain.

The natives call this cl.u.s.ter of peaks Ude (great) Youang, and the other West-North-West seven miles, Anuke (little) Youang. Another solitary high round hill, fifteen miles further nearly, in the same direction, is called Bununyong.

We have thus five native names of places in the immediate neighbourhood of Port Phillip, having the termination ng, and we may perhaps add another, the Barwon being probably Barwong. At King George's Sound in Western Australia, the names end in up, and again to the eastward, near Gipps' Land, the final letter is n. These observations may probably a.s.sist in directing the attention of philologists to the subject of the distribution of the Australian dialects or languages.

Ude Youang, or as Captain Flinders named it, Station Peak, is a granite ma.s.s elevated 1370 feet above the sea. At Geelong there is some confusion in the formation. The rocks, however, that prevail are trappean.

FOSSIL Sh.e.l.lS.

In digging a well there, a fossil cowrie (Cypraea eximia) of an extinct species was once found at the depth of sixty feet. Another specimen of the same sh.e.l.l was dug up at Franklin village near Launceston, from a hundred and forty feet below the surface of the soil. Count Strzelecki gives a figure of it in his interesting work.

Mr. Ronald Gunn, in his observations on the flora of Geelong, observes that out of a hundred species of plants collected indiscriminately, sixty-seven were also to be found in Tasmania, leaving only thirty-three to indicate the peculiarities of the Geelong vegetation.

Some of the officers of the Beagle exhibited at this place symptoms of being infected with the land-speculating mania we had witnessed at Melbourne, by bidding for some of the allotments of the township of Geelong, which were just then selling. One that was bought for 80 pounds might have been sold a year afterwards for 700 pounds. I mention this fact that the reader may see what a ruinous system was then in vogue.

ARTHUR'S SEAT.

On the morning of January 5, we left Geelong, touched at Hobson's Bay for a chronometric departure, and proceeded to sea by the south channel.

Arthur's Seat is a good guide for its entrance from Hobson's Bay, the channel pa.s.sing close under the foot of it. The eastern extremity of the northern banks, we found very difficult to make out, from the water being but slightly discoloured on it. It is, moreover, on account of its steepness, dangerous to approach. From this eastern corner of the bank, Arthur's Seat bears South 50 1/2 degrees West and a solitary patch of cliff, westward of the latter, South 68 degrees East.

In consequence of bad weather it was three days before we pa.s.sed through the channel, which, we were pleased to find navigable for line of battle ships. A West 3/4 North course led through, and the least water was five fathoms on a bar at the eastern entrance, where the width is only three-tenths of a mile, whilst in the western it is one mile, with a depth of seventeen fathoms. When in the latter we saw Flinders Point between Lonsdale and Nepean Points, and as we came down the channel, the last two points were just open of each other.

PORT WESTERN.

Leaving Port Phillip, we surveyed the coast to the eastward, and anch.o.r.ed in the entrance of Port Western, after dark on the 10th. Next morning we examined the south-west part of Grant island, and moved the ship to a more secure anchorage off its North-East point. Port Western is formed between Grant and French islands in rather a remarkable manner: two great bays lie one within the other, the inner being nearly filled up by French island, whilst the outer is sheltered by Grant Island, stretching across it almost from point to point, and leaving a wide ship-channel on its western side, whilst on the eastern the pa.s.sage is narrow and fit only for boats and small vessels.

Gales between North-West and South-West detained us here until the 19th.

We found water by digging on the North-East extreme of Grant Island, which at high tide is a low sandy islet. On first landing there, we found in a clump of bushes a kangaroo, very dark-coloured, indeed almost black.

His retreat being cut off he took to the water, and before a boat could reach him, sank. This not only disappointed but surprised us; for in Tasmania a kangaroo has been known to swim nearly two miles. Black swans were very numerous, and it being the moulting season, were easily run down by the boats. Their outstretched necks and the quick flap of their wings as they moved along, reminded us forcibly of a steamboat. At this season of the year when the swans cannot fly, a great act of cruelty is practised on them by those who reside on the Islands in Ba.s.s Strait, and of whom I have before spoken as sealers: they take them in large numbers and place them in confinement, without anything to eat, in fact almost starve them to death, in order that the down may not be injured by the fat which generally covers their bodies.