This is a story of labours and adventures, of romantic daring and noble endurance, such as few, if any other countries have to show. The names of such men as Tasman, Dampier, Cook, King, Fitzroy, Lushington, Austin, Babbage, Kennedy, Burke and Wills, Howitt and Walker, suggest to all that are acquainted with Australian discovery a host of scenes in which Englishmen took a noble and brave part, and made their names as famous in the wilderness as they have since become in the world. And when we call to mind that the peoples of Australia are almost entirely of our own race and kindred, bound to us by the closest ties of blood, commerce, and common fortunes, it is clear that a good sketch of their history must possess a deep and lasting interest for the public. Mr. Howitt is well fitted to be their historian, not simply by his natural gifts as a writer, but by his wide and varied experience as a traveller, and by the occupation of his two sons, one as an explorer in Australia and the other in New Zealand. He had omitted no fair research or exertion to render his sketch attractive and complete, and we are bound to add that his efforts are crowned with success. THE MORNING POST, APRIL 25, 1865. The title of this work opens up a vista of adventure, enterprise, and daring which is without parallel in the world of fiction and romance. Its heroes are travellers by land and by water, “men of might and high achievement,” and great pioneers, who made their age and country famous, and all succeeding time their debtors. For all sorts and conditions of men the work possesses attractions. The studious will find it a storehouse of information, carefully collected and imparted with a graceful and graphic pen; those who have not outlived the sympathies of youth will, while they peruse its pages, recall the pleasurable emotions with which in the days gone by they followed heroic voyagers into seas over which a cloud of mystery had theretofore hung, and traced their perilous progress from land to land; while the younger reader will have in the history an instructive and delightful study. To all it will be a source of interest to watch the growth of an Anglo-Saxon empire at the antipodes from feeble infancy to robust youth, and to speculate upon the probable greatness of its future from the rapid development which has taken place during its brief career. * * * * * These are examples of the opinions of the general press, which, without exception, have been of the most unexampled commendatory character. * * * * * Billing, Printer, Guildford. Transcriber’s Notes