Originally founded as a penal settlement for convicts sentenced to transportation for long periods of years, and in fact composed at first of such unpromising elements, this splendid country is at present one of the wealthiest and most important colonies of the British Crown, and close to that spot where, on 28th January, 1788, 850 criminals were landed, there to take up their involuntary abode, there now rises in one of the numerous coves of the splendidly situate Bay of Port Jackson, a city of such magnificence, so large and so beautiful, that it has been called the "Queen of the South," or even, with more enthusiasm than accuracy, "Little London." The population of the city and environs is estimated at 93,000, that of this single colony at 350,000, while its trade has increased to such an extent that it keeps employed 1000 ships and 18,000 men, the value of exports of raw, and import of manufactured products, amounting for this one port to upwards of £12,000,000 per annum. The discovery of abundant gold-fields in the adjacent colony of Victoria has undoubtedly materially contributed to this enormous expansion, and has perceptibly increased the immigration, but the development of the capabilities of the land itself has not been less steadily increasing, wherever the population have pursued the surer and more solid occupation of agriculture and cattle-rearing. The wool growth of Australia, which in 1820 was barely 50 tons, has since then risen to nearly 25,000 tons, rivalling in bulk and quality that of the Cape, and rapidly becoming a dangerous competitor with those countries of Europe, whose wools have hitherto commanded their own terms in the English market.