Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/488

 marked channel, Oxiey determined to steer to the eastern coast. The Castlereagh arrested him for a week, but he reached the Arhnthnot Range, and ascended Mount Ex- mouth on the 8th August. Passing on to what he called Hardwiek Eaiige, he surmounted all difficulties, and reach- ing a beautiful and rich pastoral land on his way, called it Liverpool Plains* On his Lachlan journey be had seen the Myall tree, fl which Allan Cunningham had called the Acacia pendula. ^ At Liverpool Plauis he saw it in its most graceful forms, and most redundant growth. Crossing the Peel river, he ^ ascended the western slope of the cord ill era, attained the ^M table-land of New England where it divides the waters of theNamoi from those of theMacleay, and reached suddenly one of the most startling sights which could confront a traveller. As he passed over an undulating country, the hi^nd terminated. An abysH was before him. The waters of various streams found their way by broken waterfalls, and readied the bottom of a gorge from one to two thousand feet in depth. The Hides of the ravine were precipitous^ rock. Lesser clefts branched here and there to make extrication more difficult- He bad reached the edge of the New England Falls. Descent was impossible. He determined to sldrt the gigantic precipice till some practic- able place could be found which would enable him to reach the sea. Foiled as he was by this sheer wall of rock, and gazing downwanls into the distant depths, where the streams tumbled foaming among the boulders at the foot of each mountain side, Oxley could yet admire it. '* It would be impossible," he said, *' to form any idea of the wild magnificence of the scenery without the aid of Balvator's pencil/' H After vain efforts to descend towards the sea, he found ii " way to the south of the falls, where be named Mount Seaview, whence he descried the coast4ine. The ascent h and descent were diihcult. None but those who have been H in a primeval mountain forest can understand how, in the ^ absence of all path or track, the growing timber, the fallen trees, the tangled underwood, the preci[)ices, ravines, and crags, thwart the progress of an exploring party. Oxley overcH,me all difficulties, and by a tributary of a river (he