Page:The State and Position of Western Australia.djvu/27

 At the close of his journal, he gives this opinion of the country he had explored:—“I do not hesitate in saying, without fear of future contradiction, that the area passed over contained as much, perhaps more land fit for all rural purposes, than any portion of equal extent (at least as far as I know) in New South Wales.”

Among those to whose enterprize and exertions the colonists are indebted for very valuable information respecting their territory, it would be injustice to omit the name of Lieut. Dale, of the 63rd regiment, who has been engaged, perhaps more than any other person, in exploring the interior at Swan River and King George’s Sound.

To this officer the colonists are indebted for the discovery, in August 1830, of the country to the eastward of the Darling Range, by far the finest district yet occupied. His services in the Survey Department, to which he was attached for several years, were deemed so important, that the Governor more than once expressed his sense of them, in his dispatches to the Secretary of State.

On the early state of the Swan River Settlement a short memoir will be found in the first number of the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, by Sir John Barrow, whose knowledge and judgment on all subjects connected with newly-explored countries, render any information from him on these points peculiarly valuable. To this is annexed an interesting paper by that most eminent botanist, Mr. Robert