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 vi respecting the colony when, eight years ago, we first meditated a sojourn in the Southern hemisphere. The peculiar isolation of Swan River, which is imparted to it by its physical geography, has also cut it off in great measure from free communication with its nearer neighbours, so that, even in the other portions of Australia itself, very misty ideas are entertained with regard to it. The following pages do not pretend to the character of either a guide or a history of the colony. They are simply, as their name implies, sketches of the writer's own experiences as a chaplain's wife during five years spent in a country where English colonists of a past generation were disappointed because their ignorance respecting it had induced them to cherish hopes which could never attain fruition, but where modern emigrants may find substantial good if they will confine their expectations to what the land is really capable of producing. The emigrant who desires to meet with minute and technical information will find that the blue book, containing the records of the census of the colony of Western Australia taken in 1870, together with observations upon the results of the census, published by the Registrar-General, Mr. Knight, will be of much service to him. He would also find it advantageous to furnish himself with a little history of Western Australia compiled by the son of the Registrar, Mr. William Knight, containing tables of statistics upon every point on which the intending emigrant or settler could wish to be advised. Both these works