on leaving the colony for England, was to endeavour if possible to get out his wife and child, as he told me he had no doubt of being able to do well both for himself and his family in New South Wales.

The first dwelling-house erected on my brother's farm was formed of rough slabs of split timber, the lower ends of which were sunk in the ground, the upper extremities being bound together by a wall-plate. It was thatched with reeds or coarse grass, and contained three apartments-a parlour or sitting-room, a storeroom, and a bed-room, each of which, however, was occasionally used for other purposes. The kitchen was detached, and was inhabited by a convict-servant and his wife. The bare ground served as a floor, and the interstices between the slabs were plastered with a composition of mud, the walls being white-washed both within and without. This homely building, which I am sure would not cost £20, was afterwards furnished with glass windows and a floor of rough boards, and served as the farm-cottage for three or four years. By that time considerable improvement had been effected on the land, and a suitable situation had been pitched on for the future and permanent dwelling-house. A range of out-buildings of stone, intended for a kitchen, storeroom, &c., was accordingly erected in that situation, and fitted up and occupied as a second temporary residence, the wooden building being then given up to the farm-overseer. At length a permanent dwelling-house was erected adjoining the out-buildings, on an elevated and commanding situation, between the two lagoons, and about half a mile from the river. It is a two-story

house, built of hewn stone, having a verandah or covered portico all round. It was nearly finished when I left the colony.

In short, the maxim of all prudent settlers in the salubrious climate of New South Wales is the one divinely recommended by King Solomon, nearly three thousand years ago, to the Jewish colonists whom he seems to have settled in some of the conquests of his father David; for it can scarcely apply to the case of a country already settled: "Prepare thy work without, and make it fit for thyself in the field; and AFTERWARDS build thine house.”—Proverbs, xxiv. 27. A prudent settler, who expends his capital in improving his land, and in securing a profitable and regular return for his labour, in the first instance, will be able, in a very few years after his first settlement, to build a much better house than he is likely to erect on his farm when there is no other improvement effected upon it; and the inconvenience of being but indifferently lodged in the mean time is but a small matter comparatively in a climate like that of New South Wales.

The advantages enjoyed in such cases as the one I have just described, over those likely to be enjoyed by respectable free emigrants arriving in the colony at present, are, 1st, The more eligible tenure of the land; which, in the case of emigrants arriving in the colony a few years ago, was granted in portions of five hundred to two thousand five hundred and sixty acres at a small quitrent, but which is now uniformly sold by the colonial government at a price of not less than five shillings an acre, 2nd, Superior locality; the farm I have just

described being situated in the centre of a compara tively populous district, and possessing the inestimable advantage of steam-navigation.

At the same time, it must be recollected that in other respects equally important, the circumstances of the colony are incomparably more favourable now than they were seven years ago for the settlement of a respectable family, either in the interior or on the coast. The same amount of capital which it required to stock a large farm moderately with horses, sheep, and cattle, seven years ago, will do more than purchase a farm of the same extent now, and stock it also. Besides, the cost of maintaining a family for twelve or eighteen months after their arrival is at present less than one half of what it was at the period I refer to, while the price of wool-the staple article of colonial produce is as high as ever. To the sheep or cattle-farmer, distance is a matter of very small moment; for cattle travel to the market themselves, and the cost of conveying wool to the shipping-port, from a great distance in the interior, is comparatively trifling. On the other hand, the extension of steam-navigation along the eastern coast of New Holland will, I am confident, very soon render it a matter of no consequence to the agriculturist, whether he is fifty or five hundred miles from the capital, provided he is within reach of a navigable river, or harbour, or good roadstead, on the coast. In all likelihood there will very shortly be a steam-boat plying regularly between Sydney and Hobart Town, the capital of Van Dieman's Land. In that case an agriculturist would just be as favourably situated for the colo

nial market at Twofold Bay, at the southern extremity of the Australian land, as at Hunter's River.

In short, I see no reason why persevering industry, or rather vigilance and economy, should not lead to equally favourable results in the present circumstances of the colony, with those to which they have evidently led in the instance I have mentioned, as well as in many others, with which I am not so intimately acquainted. Let the reader not imagine, however, that there is any thing to be gained in New South Wales without persevering industry conjoined with prudent management and economy. Wherever our lot is cast in the wide world-whether we are called to earn a mere livelihood by contending with the unpropitiousness of the seasons and the stubbornness of the soil, or to struggle for far higher interests with hostile principalities and powers, this is the uniform condition of mortality,

Nil sine magno

Vita labore dedit mortalibus;

or, in other words, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground.”

CHAPTER III.

NOTICES OF THE SETTLEMENTS OF BATHURST AND ILLAWARRA.

"The man waxed great and went forward, and grew until he became very great. For he had possession of flocks, and possession of herds, and great store of servants." Genesis, xxvi. 13.

THE road to Bathurst, or, as it is more frequently called, the Great Western Road, branches off from the Parramatta road at the eastern extremity of the town of Parramatta. At the distance of a few miles from Parramatta is the settlement of Prospect, the residence of several small settlers, and of a few families of higher class. In this neighbourhood the country, which is of an undulating character, exhibits that singular feature which I have already mentioned, and which is elsewhere observable in the colony; the ground on the declivities and on the summits of the hills being of inexhaustible fertility, while in the hollows or lower levels it is comparatively unproductive. I have myself frequently observed, when riding in the interior, either before sunrise or after sunset during the winter months, that while the temperature on the high grounds was