We had already visited some of the northern shores of the harbour, but we had not penetrated to the west. The day was fine, the weather propitious. Our steamer started from Fort Macquarie, and we sailed first to the outer harbour, gaining varied impressions of the serrated, undulating shores; past the old Federal Government House, and the beautiful Botanic Gardens, which adjoin the public park, known as the Domain, and run down to the shore; past Macquarie Point and Wooloomooloo; past Rushcutter’s Bay, and past the charming Rose Bay, to the steep escarpment of the North and South Heads, where the Pacific comes rolling up its breakers. On the return journey we went as far as Cockatoo Island in the Parramatta River, one of the most westerly of the many picturesque islands scattered within the harbour. Here are the Government docks, originally constructed by convicts; for Cockatoo Island was formerly a penal settlement. In the last year or two the docks have been very much extended, and shipbuilding is now carried on on a large scale.
At the colliery of Balmain coal-mining is carried on at a great depth below the harbour. It was growing late when we returned to our starting-point, but the evening light was loveliest of all on Kirribilli Point above which a crescent moon was hanging.
CHAPTER XV
THE BLUE MOUNTAINS AND A BUSH PICNIC
We had heard much of the famous Blue Mountains during our progress from West Australia to New South Wales and were anxious to visit them. In the early days they formed an impenetrable barrier between Sydney and the rich country beyond. Many vain and unsuccessful attempts were made to cross these labyrinthine ranges. Each successive line of heights is so like another, its eucalyptus-covered shoulders with the deep, blind gorges between, for long baffled and defied all attempts at exploration. The first of these efforts was undertaken as early as 1793–4 by three naval officers; but it was not till 1813, in the time of Governor Macquarie, that some settlers interested in stock-breeding won their way through. For a time, like all their predecessors, they got entangled in the bewildering network of gorges that make travelling here so difficult, but at last, chancing upon a dividing spur that ran westward, they pursued its ridge till, arriving at the summit, they saw below them a fairly open valley with a running stream and good pasture.
Governor Macquarie at once followed up the important discovery by sending out another expedition, which led to the discovery of a river flowing westward, the “Macquarie River,” and subsequently opened up the country beyond. A road was constructed across the mountain in 1815. Early inland exploration in Australia forms an interesting and often tragic chapter in the history of the continent. Its story has been told in detail in Favenc’s “Australian Exploration.”
We got up very early in the morning. How delightful it was to throw open the shutters on to the green trees and lawns of the garden with the busy blue waters of the harbour below, the big ships lading and unlading their cargo on to tenders, the little local steamers bustling to and fro, looking as if there was not room for them all. Breakfast, including a very agreeable kind of marmalade jelly, made of sweet oranges, was brought to us at seven o’clock, and we started shortly afterwards. It was a still morning with a threat of rain, and heavy, drifting clouds. The water round the little wooden landing-stage of Kirribilli Point is so clear that small shoals of fish can be seen distinctly swimming about the piles, and we watched for some time a little speckled thing that looked like a mouse in shape.
NATIONAL PASS, BLUE MOUNTAINS.
We passed out of the suburbs of Sydney, through the outlying red wooden houses, with corrugated iron roofs, surrounded by greenery and standing in cleared spaces. Then came green fields, sometimes with the dead trees or their stumps still remaining. We noticed numerous orange trees before we left the populated district. The hour was still very early; we slept peacefully for the greater part of the journey. Unless the faculty of sleeping in a train is cultivated, there is no enjoyment for the Australian traveller, for he must always journey scores of miles to get anywhere, and the country, generally speaking, varies little in character. On this occasion we awoke to find ourselves in a sort of Swiss scenery, with range on range of blue hills. This endless vista of gum-covered hill after gum-covered hill made it easy to see why for years the Blue Mountains were the despair of pioneers, who, surmounting one range, found another in front of them exactly the same. The view was only varied by red escarpments in places. The stopping-places, as we slowly mounted higher, were entirely conventional. We might have been looking out on a suburb of London—Sydenham, for instance, as far as the aspect of the neat suburban houses was concerned. The illusion was deepened by the appearance of “Springfield Ladies’ College,” very trim and sedate among its neighbours, only the gardens bore camellia bushes for roses.