Having passed the “ploughed ground,” Bong Bong, Mittagong range, &c. I continued, through a country parched by the summer heats, or having a burnt aspect, from the custom among the settlers or natives, of setting fire to the dried grass. The scorched and arid appearance of the land, as my journey led towards Sydney, was wretched, compared with the beautiful verdant plains and ranges I had left in the Tumat, Murrumbidgee, and Yas countries. The harvest was for the most part reaped; a few scattered patches animated by the verdure of the young maize springing up, and the yellow flowers of the native “Jibbong,” (_Persoonia sp._,) with a few other flowering shrubs, scattered about, was all that cheered the eye of the traveller on the journey. I arrived at Sydney on the 2nd of Jan. 1833. The houses by the road side, on the approach to Sydney from Liverpool, or Paramatta, are very neat in their construction. A bark-hut near the “metropolis” is daily becoming rarer; they are speedily giving place to neat and even elegant verandah cottages. There are certainly an abundance of public-houses in the colony, and the neat, clean appearance of the attendants, as well as the interior of the inns, may vie with those in the mother-country. The signs of the taverns assume every variety, all but that of _Temperance_. It has often been mentioned by writers upon the United States of America, that a purer and more correct English is spoken in that country than in the “old country,” where it is corrupted by so many different provincial dialects. The remark respecting the United States of America will equally apply to Australia; for among the native-born Australians, (descended from European parents,) the English spoken is very pure; and it is easy to recognize a person from _home_ or one born in the colony, no matter of what class of society, from this circumstance.