Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1.: With an Account of the Coasts and Rivers Explored and Surveyed During; The Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, in the Years 1837-38-39-40-41-42-43.; By Command of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. Also a Narrative; Of Captain Owen Stanley's Visits to the Islands in the Arafura Sea.Stokes, John Lort
History
Discoveries in Australia, Volume 1.: With an Account of the Coasts and Rivers Explored and Surveyed During; The Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, in the Years 1837-38-39-40-41-42-43.; By Command of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. Also a Narrative; Of Captain Owen Stanley's Visits to the Islands in the Arafura Sea.
Stokes, John Lort
Australia -- Description and travel; Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Natural history -- Australia
The singular sloping treeless sides of the Barabul hills, and the
declivities of the valley of the Marabul river, bear a striking
resemblance to many parts of Eastern Patagonia. They appear as if they
had just emerged from the sea, which had as it were scooped out their
hollows and smoothed their sides. A remarkable high round hill, perfectly
bare of trees, and called by the natives Moriac, bore West 1/2 South six
miles from where we stood. On our return we met some of the natives; they
were the first I had seen of the aborigines of this part of the
continent, and were certainly a finer race than the people on the western
coasts. They complained of the white men bringing animals into their
country that scare away the kangaroo, and destroy the roots which at
certain seasons of the year form part of their sustenance. This, Mr.
Smith told me, was a very general complaint.
I spent a very pleasant evening at Captain Fyans' comfortable quarters,
in the course of which arrangements were made for next day's journey to
Station Peak, Mr. Smith kindly offering to lend me a horse and to
accompany me.
STATION PEAK.
January 3.
We started for Station Peak very early. The morning air had a
delightfully bracing effect; and the grass glittered with a copious fall
of dew. The first five miles of road lay over a high down, with pretty
patches of woodland interspersed; and the remaining ten over a low plain
that stretches to the foot of the peak. Six miles from the latter we
crossed a hollow where I noticed some calcareous matter, in which were
included shells of recent species, evidently showing that an upheaval had
taken place in this part of the continent. We saw on the plain several
large bustards resembling a light brown domestic turkey.
Leaving our horses at the foot of the peak, we ascended it by a sloping
ridge on the south-east face. Huge blocks of granite--some poised on a
point as if the slightest touch would send them rolling and thundering to
the plains below--covered the sides and summits of this and the smaller
peak, to the north of which are several others scattered over about a
mile of ground.
On reaching the summit, I hastened to a pile of stones which Captain
Flinders had erected to commemorate his visit; but, alas, the bottle and
paper left by him were gone, and I have not since been able to learn who
it was that took away this interesting and valuable record.
VIEW FROM STATION PEAK.
The view commanded all points of the splendid sheet of water called Port
Phillip, which stretched away its shining expanse seemingly almost from
our very feet; whilst north-east two long wavy lines of trees showed the
course of the Little and Weariby rivers meandering through
the plain.
The natives call this cluster of peaks Ude (great) Youang, and the other
West-North-West seven miles, Anuke (little) Youang. Another solitary high
round hill, fifteen miles further nearly, in the same direction, is
called Bununyong.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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