Page:History of New South Wales from the records, Volume 2.djvu/40

 24 THE FAMINE OF 178»-90. 1780-90 ItB first residents. Their gardou plots. Ck)nyict8 sent to Norfolk Island. containing, as it did, seven or eight thousand young plants.* Southwell writes 27th July, 1790 :— "Our numbers lately were eleven ; my companion,! self, and seven men are all upon this little settlement ; one man looks out for the expected Gorgon, and is relieved in turn at every four hours between the dawn and setting of the day. The Lookout is up a craggy eminence, about a mile from this spot, where are the houses, or rather white- washed cottages, in a valley adjoining to the garden, and near the beach. The ground for a good space about here is unusually clear, with here and there a shrub, and at a distance in passing looks like a pleasant lawn. We have a rill of fresh water at a stone's throw on each hand." The "white-washed cottages" and the garden are no longer to be seen, but the position they occupied can be made out without much difficulty. The means of identifi- cation are the two rills of water mentioned by Southwell. One of these little streams runs through the recreation- ground, and until a few years ago found its way to the sea through the late Sir John Robertson's garden, but for convenience' sake it has been diverted from its course. The other enters the bay on the north side of Bay-street. Between these two points there is a stretch of level ground occupied by dwelling-houses. The rills or creeks which were insignificant a hundred years ago, when the hills from which they flowed were clothed with scrub and trees, are now almost dry, except in rainy weather, but their course can be distinctly traced.^ Of the garden, which exhibited a hundred years ago such a " pleasing prospect of vegitation,'' not a trace remains. In the month of February, 1790, no ships from England having arrived, Phillip resolved to send a number of the people to Norfolk Island, with the object of relieving the principal settlement. That place was no better provisioned • Southwell to the Eev. W. Butler. — Historical Eecords, vol. ii, p. 716. t One of the non-commissioned officers of the Sirius, Mr. Harris. X Only twenty-five years ago the cliffs about the lighthouse and signal- station were covered with dense scrub and trees. Host of this vegetation was destroyed by a fire in 1868.