Page:Rambles in Australia (IA ramblesinaustral00grewiala).pdf/35

Rh smooth white stems; but whatever the variety, the prevailing tinge is a bluish grey. Sometimes the forest or "bush" has been cleared away to make room for orchards, and crops, or towns, or grazing land; sometimes acres of trees have been "ringbarked," as it is called, a rapid and cheap way of clearing land, by cutting out a ring of bark so that the tree dies, and only a skeleton forest remains, letting in light and air to the soil. But the "bush" is never very far away. It seems to be only waiting to close in again, and swallow up once more what has been so laboriously cleared. West, east, north, and south, the gum tree predominates, though the bush varies in the nature of its undergrowth, which in the tropics becomes rich and beautiful.

The general effect of Australian landscape to English eyes produces an impression of austerity. It is never friendly, perhaps because of the general absence of water, the sombre wooded hills, the vast dun plains, have something aloof and forbidding.

It would be difficult to find anything in life more stimulating and delightful than the first walk in a new country, where every sight and sound is unfamiliar. Strolling along the soft, hot sandy road that first morning, past the low-verandahed houses, each with its wooden palisade, its