CHAPTER XVIII.
SIGHTS OF SYDNEY——BOTANY BAY AND PARAMATTA.
After leaving the Blue Mountains behind them, our friends were whirled onward through a more fertile country than the one they had traversed on the western slope. As they approached Sydney, they found the country dotted with pleasant residences and diversified with fields and forest in a very picturesque way. At the appointed hour the train rolled into the station at Sydney, and landed the strangers in that ancient city; ancient from an Australian point of view, as it is the oldest settlement on the island continent, but exceedingly modern when compared with London, Paris, and other European capitals.
As our friends drove in the direction of the hotel where they intended to stay, they were struck by the narrowness of the streets, which seemed to them very narrow indeed, after the wide streets of Melbourne.
Harry wondered how the difference of the streets of the two cities could be accounted for.
“Oh, I understand,” said Ned. “Sydney was laid out by an English surveyor, and Melbourne by an American. Being a native of the little island called England, the Britisher felt that he must make the most of the land he had, while the American, coming from his own wide-spreading country, took all the room that he wanted. That’s the way of it, I’m sure.”
“Well, that will do for an explanation,” said Harry, “until we get at the real facts in the case.”
“The probabilities are,” the doctor remarked, “that as Sydney was originally a convict settlement, the officers that came out in charge of the expedition felt that it should be made as compact as possible for the greater facility of guarding the convicts. In this way the narrowness of the streets may be accounted for.”
“They didn’t foresee the tramways in the streets, and the steam cars running upon them,” said Harry, as a noisy little steam engine drawing two passenger cars passed close to their carriage.