How Mr. William Ryrie, in the year 1837 or 1838, brought his flocks and herds and general pioneer equipment straight across country from Arnprior in far Monaro in New South Wales, hitting precisely upon this tenantless lodge in the wilderness, will always be a marvel. It was one of the feats which the earlier explorers occasionally performed, showing their fitness for the heroic work of colonisation, wherein so many of them risked life and limb. With the great pastoral wild of Australia Felix lying virgin and unappropriated before him, Mr. Ryrie might easily have made a more profitable, a more expansive choice. But he could not have hit upon a more ideal spot for the founding of an estate and the formation of a homestead had he searched the continent. Amid the variously-gathered outfit which accompanied the pastoral chief, as he led flocks, herds, and retainers through unknown wilds to the far promised land, happened to be some roots of the tree, the survival of which caused Noah so much uneasiness, and more or less humbled his descendants, before John Jameson and Co. took up the running with the now fashionable product of the harmless _avena_. A few grape vines reached the spot unharmed. Planted in the first orchard on the rich alluvial of the broad river-flat which fronted the cottage, they grew and flourished, so richly that the area devoted to the vine was soon enlarged. From such small beginning arose the vineyards of Yering and St. Hubert's. From those, again, Messrs. de Pury and others planted the wine-producing district which has now a European reputation. Little of this, however, was apparent to my companion and myself, or we might have been entertaining royalty by this time--who knows?--carrying ourselves like other eminent and gilded colonists, envied by everybody and sneered at by our less fortunate compatriots. We rode steadily on, through hill and hollow, past plump cattle, not, however, showing quite so much white and roan as do the present herds; past a "manada" of mares and foals, from which ran out to challenge our steeds Clifton the Second, "with flying mane and arching crest." Finally we ride up to a neat weatherboard cottage, whence issues our kindly, warm-hearted host, breathing welcome and hospitality in every tone of his jolly voice. We were soon enjoying the change of sensation, which after a thirty-mile ride is of itself a luxury. With him as visitors were "Hobbie" Elliot, a well-known squatter of the period, and a stalwart younger brother just out from home.