One of the greatest efforts to which the industry and powers of man can be directed is to change a lonely uncultivated wilderness into an enclosed and fruitful country,--to occupy with civilised human beings and comfortable dwellings those wilds which have hitherto been nearly deserted, or at best but scantily and occasionally inhabited by savage barbarians. The colonisation of New South Wales by the English has been one of the most successful of these efforts; and certainly never before did the change effected by industry so rapidly make itself visible in the face of the new country. But, although the settlement of this colony may now be most certainly pronounced to have been a very successful experiment, it was by no means without hazard, and disappointment, and suffering, to those who were first engaged in it. Indeed it would appear to be the lot of infant colonies to cope with difficulties known only to first settlers in uncultivated lands; and while the enterprising colonist has to endure and struggle against these early trials, his children or grandchildren, or often the stranger who has made a favourable bargain of his property, are the persons who reap the reward of his toils. It must assuredly be a subject of interest to every inquiring mind to trace the feeble beginnings of an infant colony, accompanying it through all its variations of hope and despondency, of good or ill success, until it is at length conducted to a state of greatness and prosperity quite unexampled, when the shortness of its duration is considered. And since that colony is our own, since Britain is, for several reasons, unusually concerned, both morally and politically, in the welfare of New South Wales, it cannot but be useful as well as interesting to inquire somewhat concerning the past history, previously to our entering upon the present state, of that settlement.