Page:Rambles in Australia (IA ramblesinaustral00grewiala).pdf/255

 yellow flower. We had reached our destination of Pittwater, an arm of Broken Bay, so named by Captain Cook. It looks like a great lake, the low hilly shores covered with trees down to the water's edge. Our motor-boat was waiting at the end of a little jetty. The tide was low, and in the mud alongside were myriads of little crabs that disappeared with astonishing rapidity, scutling into their holes. It was a pretty little voyage across this smooth arm of the sea, in which big yellowish-green jelly-fish floated beside us. At the landing on the opposite side of the creek the shore was fringed with small oysters.

In the bush spring flowers were already beginning to appear. Ferns and cotton palms grew among the gums, a yellow clematis was coming into flower, and the lovely pink starlike Queensland rose, that is not really a rose, but a kind of boronia. We lunched at one of the picnic places provided by the forethought of a paternal government, with a place to boil the billy all ready, and a wooden shelter with rough benches and table. There is always plenty of dry wood in Australia; a soft-water tank was part of the equipment, and the billy was soon boiling; so we had our billy tea and damper, a kind of unleavened bread that is very agreeable, and it was great fun, though the pioneer effect of it was rather