THE COUNTRY ADJACENT.
The bed of the river was composed of fine white sand. The country had a gentle slope from the interior, and no land of any great elevation was visible from the farthest point I attained, distant about fifteen miles from the coast.
Plains of a rich reddish loam bordered the river on each side. These were occasionally broken by low, gently-rounded hills, composed of the same soil. Freshwater lagoons, frequented by wild-fowl, were found in several places; and during the course of my walks, which extended for several miles in various directions, I saw no termination to this good land except on approaching the sea, where the salt marshes always commenced; but along the southern bank of the river, to the point where its mouth actually disembogued into the open bay, the land was of a fertile description: the country, even in the dry season, during which we were there, being covered with rich grass.
I ought here to state that this river is the most southern one that I have ascertained to be deficient in that universal characteristic of all those in the south-west of this continent: an estuary. I must observe that I have not seen the mouths of three or four of the rivers before enumerated, and cannot therefore say that some of them may not terminate in estuaries; but the Gascoyne discharges its waters by two mouths of considerable magnitude, between which lies Babbage Island, the southern mouth being in latitude 24 degrees 57 minutes.
This is also the most southern river on the western side of this continent where the rise and fall of tide is sufficiently great to exercise any influence upon it relatively to the purposes of navigation. Hence it would appear that the presence of estuaries at the mouths of rivers on this coast is in some way connected with the amount of tidal elevation at the points where they are found. The rise and fall here was about five and a half feet; but there is only one full tide in twenty-four hours. The first tide rises to a certain point, and it has scarcely commenced to ebb, ere the second comes slowly in, so that, to a careless observer, only one tide is perceptible.
PROVINCE OF VICTORIA.
The province of Victoria is situated between the parallels of 27 degrees 30 minutes and 29 degrees 30 minutes south latitude; its most considerable river is the Hutt, which disembogues into a large estuary. A few miles above the estuary the river separates into two branches, both of which were running strong at the time we passed them.
Previously to our reaching the Hutt our boats had all been wrecked; I had therefore no opportunity of examining whether the estuary of this river was navigable or not; from its size however I should be inclined to the affirmative. The other principal streams which drain this district are the Buller, and the Murchison.
One remarkable feature in the province of Victoria is that the carboniferous series is here developed throughout a tract of Western Australia extending in latitude from the bottom of Geographe Bay to near Cape Cuvier, and which I have carefully examined. The tract above alluded to is the only one in which I have yet found the rocks belonging to this series: this circumstance therefore imparts a very high degree of interest to the district in question.
Within a few weeks after my return from the province of Victoria applications from settlers were made to the Government of Western Australia to permit them to occupy a district which had been so highly spoken of; this application was however unsuccessful, but an expedition was subsequently sent there to ascertain if there was a navigable entrance to the Hutt River. In this object the expedition was unsuccessful, but the vessel touched at the Abrolhos Islands and at some parts of the adjacent coast, including Port Grey.*