Clement Hodgkinson

“ The greatest drought which has ever yet been experienced in the northern district was in 1841-2; the natural grasses at our stations were then quite desiccated on the ranges, and the whole country was continually in flames; the only young grass for the cattle and sheep being in the flats. Notwithstanding this, the chains of water-holes were as frill of water as ever, and I never saw finer crops of wheat than were reaped during this droughty season on the alluvial farms on the banks of the Wilson river, and at the squatting stations on the MacLeay river. ”

“ I soon passed another sheep-station situated on a gentle eminence. My attention was now drawn to the birds in this part of the country, for since I had left the Manning I had not seen any of the parrot tribe, with the exception of the Rosella or Nonpareil parroquet, a bird extremely common throughout the colony generally, but of which I had never seen a single specimen during the long time that I had been at the MacLeay river. The whistling magpie was in almost every tree, and is also a common bird in Australia generally, but I have never seen it at the MacLeay or Nambucca rivers. ”

“ Should cheap labourers, such as Chinese or Coolies, ever be introduced into the colony, it is not improbable that, at some future period, the banks of these northern rivers may be diversified by plantations of sugar-cane, cotton, coffee, rice, &c.; for all these productions have been ascertained from experiments to succeed well north of Port Macquarie. There would be one great advantage also, that the climate would be better suited to Europeans, than that of almost any other country in which these productions are grown. ”

“ It must not however be imagined, from the foregoing observations, that I consider the coast country, north of Port Macquarie, superior to other parts of the colony for agricultural and pastoral pursuits, or other ordinary colonial occupations, unless vineyards. For it is too mountainous, densely wooded, and swampy, to be so good as many other parts for sheep, and wheat and potatoes do not grow there so well as in the extreme southern districts. ”

“ The climate of the district of Port Macquarie is much more agreeable than that of Sydney; the mountains approaching nearer to the coast collect the vapours from the sea, and cause more frequent rains; in summer, especially, the heat is mitigated by many heavy thunder showers. Notwithstanding its comparative vicinity to the tropics, Port Macquarie seems almost entirely exempt from those hot scorching winds, which so frequently occur during the summer months at Sydney; or if they ever happen in the Port Macquarie district, they are so slight as to be scarcely felt. ”

“ Experience is our only guide to enable us to form an opinion of the salubrity of the climate of any country: Hong-Kong was always supposed to be a healthy island, and yet we now learn, after a frightful mortality among our troops and seamen in that settlement, that in order to guard against disease there, it is necessary to take greater care of oneself, and submit to more annoying precautions than in India itself ”

“ The climate is nearly tropical, and rather too hot for wheat, which is apt to run to straw; maize and rice would, of course, flourish, and sugar and tobacco have been tried with success. The inland dividing Blue Mountains, are very rugged and lofty, rising to 6500 feet, but to the south-west of these mountains is the extensive range of pastoral districts, called Liverpool Plains. Port Macquarie is a bar harbour, into which vessels, drawing more than nine feet of water, cannot safely enter; there is good anchorage outside, and the shore is not dangerous. ”

“ There are some places in New South Wales, few and far between, where considerable taste has been displayed in the arrangement of the grounds, but in general the ne plus ultra of colonial landscape gardening is a square patch of land, laid out in straight walks, and surrounded by hideous pailings, whilst no flowers, or even culinary vegetables, enliven the dwellings of the labouring classes, unless some stray melon or pumpkin sends its long shoots round their huts. ”

“ Those sudden, violent gusts of wind, also, from the south, which generally happen at the close of a hot day in Sydney, raising dense clouds of dust in the air, and causing the thermometer to fall twenty degrees in a quarter of an hour, are comparatively unknown in the county of Macquarie. The north-eastern part of the territory of New South Wales, between the great main range, dividing the eastern and western waters, and the ocean, has never experienced such long desolating droughts as those which have occasionally been felt in the central and western parts of New South Wales. ”

“ This elevated district is undoubtedly the best sheep country in Australia, and the squatters there have been much benefited by the diminished land carriage for their wool down this road; for short land carriage will henceforth be an object of greater importance than ever, since the Australian flock-masters have arrived at the conclusion, that the only way of disposing of their surplus sheep, is to boil them down for tallow, with a view of creating a new marketable article of export. ”

“ A little farther on is the town, built on a gentle rise, which shows to advantage its pretty little cottages with pointed roofs, its broad straight streets, coated with dark red gravel, and levelled with as much accuracy as garden walks, and its tall square church tower conspicuously prominent in the highest part of the town. ”

“ Earl informs me (and a more zealous, acute, or intelligent gentleman I have scarcely ever met,) that the land which is flooded and swampy on the peninsula is as one acre to twenty acres of the dry land; the swamp land can easily be cultivated with rice, and the land not fitted to receive that grain produces the finest cotton; the valleys which are not sufficiently extensive for the cultivation of rice, are admirably adapted for the growth of sugar; cocoa should also be tried, and paper mulberry for the production of silk-worms. Indigo grows wild and is of the best quality ”

“ The Richmond river, a little farther along the coast, disembogues near Lennox Head, in 28° 55' south latitude. It very much resembles the MacLeay in its general appearance, and the character of its scenery: mangrove scrubs, tea-tree, and swamp oak thickets, cover the low flats near its mouth; and the alluvial land, higher up the river, is diversified by brush, abounding in cedar and pine, clumps of bangolo palms, reedy swamps, small rich plains, and lightly wooded forest flats of great richness. The rest of the country is very lightly wooded grassy forest, of the greatest fertility ”

“ Round this point to the north-west, the country declined considerably in elevation, and had much the appearance of extended plains and low undulating hills, well, but not heavily, wooded. The only elevations of magnitude were some hills seven or eight hundred feet high, which we passed to the northward. The appearance and formation of the country, the slowness of the current even at ebb tide, and the depth of the water, induced me to conclude that the river will be found navigable for vessels of burden to a much greater distance, probably not less than fifty miles. ”

“ There is a signal want in Australia, even among the higher classes, of that just appreciation of the beauties of nature, and that innate taste in taking advantage of them, to enhance the picturesque effect of their neatly-arranged dwelling-houses, which, according to Washington Irving, characterize the English nation, from the peer to the peasant. ”

“ There is plenty of very good soil here to be cultivated; the first consideration is, who the cultivators should be; the natives, of whom the greater number of them here, appear to be of a mild and obliging disposition; they will carry water, and do small offices of service for a small reward of bread or rice, but they will not remain permanently fixed at any one spot. The climate is far too hot for Europeans to labour in. In the opinion of Mr. Earl, settlers from Timor, and the islands northward, would be the best ”

“ With regard to the influence of rocks on soil, Hausmann, in his work on the Connection of Geology with Agriculture and Planting, has observed that "from what has been said of the relations existing between the masses of which the crust of the globe is composed, and the loose earth or soil by which it is covered, it appears evident enough that they have great influence over its formation and nature, and therefore upon the more perfect vegetables and especially those which are the objects of cultivation ”

“ Notwithstanding these obvious causes of impure exhalations, and the greater heat of the climate, the ague at the MacLeay river is much milder than in the fenny counties of England; the cold fit occurs every other day, but is seldom so severe as to prevent a man from attending to his daily avocations. ”

“ Moreton Bay, shortly after its examination by the late Surveyor-General, was made a penal settlement for convicts under colonial sentences, and free settlers were not permitted to resort thither; but a year or two ago, the convicts were withdrawn, and this fine district was thrown open for location. Brisbane Town, a few miles up the river, contains some very good houses and stores of stone or brick, and it possesses the advantage of having in its vicinity excellent building stone, lime, coal, iron, cedar, pine, and other superior timber of useful kinds. ”

“ Again, there are in Australia an infinite number of tea-tree morasses, and reedy swamps, covered with stagnant water and rank vegetation; and the changes in the temperature, between day and night, are probably greater in Australia than in any other country, and are also very sudden. ”

“ The country in this neighbourhood would be very good for sheep, if the grass were not allowed to grow too long and too old, for when once the Australian grass becomes dry, the sheep will never eat it. ”

“ I now entered some extensive flats, covered with high grass, and timbered by large blue gum-trees and tea-trees, standing widely apart from each other. There were a great many creeks, and chains of deep water-holes here, which meandered among these flats without being enveloped in brush. The soil was very rich. This level tract extended to Major Innes' cattle station at Brinben, where I arrived at nightfall, being guided thither by the barking of the dogs, as I had ridden for some distance, to the left of the usual track to that station. ”

“ Some German missionaries have been for some time among the blacks at Moreton Bay, and one of them has obtained considerable notoriety from having deliberately accused the squatters in that district of having poisoned upwards of fifty of the native blacks. The squatters of Moreton Bay, are almost all gentlemen of education and good connections, many of them being retired officers ”

“ April 22nd.—I quitted this morning the hut of my attentive host, who rejoiced in the euphonous appellation of "Darby Joe," it being a common practice among the men in New South Wales, to bestow some slang names on the stockmen and shepherds in charge of out-stations, such as "happy Jack," "long Ned," "black Bill," "curly Tom," &c. The track led me over some high forest hills well clothed with grass, and of rich soil, whilst several of the adjacent ranges were invaded to their summits by a brush of myrtle, iron-bark, turpentine, &c. ”

“ As the Governor's order will protect these native tribes from the corrupting influence of the lower orders of the white population, the missionaries appear to entertain great hopes that their endeavours to convey some idea of religion to these Aborigines will be attended with greater success, than the many futile attempts hitherto made to convert the Australian blacks to Christianity. ”

“ Should it happen, that, at any future period, labour became sufficiently cheap and abundant, to render it profitable to clear and cultivate the rich brush land on the banks of the Brisbane and Bremer rivers at Moreton Bay, for the production of cotton, sugar, coffee, indigo, rice, &c. that district will become the most flourishing part of the colony. ”

“ There are five never-failing wells of excellent water. One by the eastern garden, near the seaside, is high enough, with the addition of a little work, to enable the water in it to be conveyed, by hose or trough, into the boat upon the shore. ”

“ He country available for grazing at this river is of excellent quality, and much more extensive than that at the MacLeay; for the country bordering on the Clarence and its tributaries is generally level, and the mountains do not attain any great elevation, except at the sources of the streams.
A great number of squatters have formed stations at the Clarence river. The communication between the table land along the main range, and the navigable estuary of the Clarence, is naturally much less difficult than at Port Macquarie ”

“ From the great number of experiments which have been made in these two settlements, there is no doubt whatever of those productions succeeding, if largely cultivated, especially at Moreton Bay. Specimens of cotton, grown in the colony, have been manufactured into yarn at Glasgow, and pronounced of superior quality. The coffee shrub grows very well, and as I have already observed elsewhere, sugar has been made at the plains on the Wilson river, at Port Macquarie, during the time that that place was a penal settlement; and I have myself seen sugar-cane growing luxuriantly in Mr. ”

“ Martin, in his "Colonial Library," entertains the same opinion of the capability of Moreton Bay to support a numerous population, and to produce in abundance the tropical productions of sugar, cotton, coffee, silk, tobacco, &c. ”