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 as green as a field of young wheat. Unlike that of New South Wales, the grass and pasture here consists of nutritious herbs and very fine grass, growing in a thick sward, and completely hiding the soil. Hills and vales alike were covered with flowers, principally of a yellow colour, and growing as thick as they could—presenting to the eye of one accustomed to the almost flowerless fields of Australia an unusual and beautiful appearance, realising in some respects the description given of English meadows. Everywhere, too, the mimosa, loveliest of the flowering trees of Australia, and destined to be as much celebrated in the lays of her poets as the hawthorn has been in those of the British bards, scented the air with its perfume, and dazzled the eye with its rich yellow blossoms. Passed over some barren ranges covered with quartz, the only thing pleasant on them being some flowering shrubs, chiefly of the mimosa species. Through some fertile flats, the roads very level and good, as indeed they were during the greater part of the day—the only fault in them being a bog here and there, which after our previous bad roads we considered a mere nothing. Met several men who were returning from the diggings, and from whom we learned that robberies and murders had of late been very frequent at Bendigo. On Wednesday last, near thirty drays were stopped by a large gang of bushrangers in the Black Forest, and rum, tobacco, and other property taken from them to a great amount. One man lost upwards of £700 worth of gold. No less than three murders have been committed during the last week at Bendigo, one in Eagle Hawk, another at Peg Log Gully, and another in the Long Gully. One of the murdered men, we are informed, had his head completely severed from the body. Our informants told us that they had heard cries of 'murder' from the tent in which one of the unfortunate men was killed, but hearing some one (probably one of the perpetrators of the crime) laugh at the same time, they thought that the men were joking among themselves. The police are out scouring the bush in all directions. We thanked our stars that we had not gone by the road through the Black Forest, as we had at first intended, since being indifferently armed, how much soever we might have wished to display our heroism, we should have had but little chance of doing so. Crossed Emu Creek; the country of slate formation; quartz in abundance. An immense number of people passing to and from the diggings; men, women, and children along the whole road from this to Bendigo. Came to Bullock Creek, where we saw the places that the diggers had made for cradling during the dry weather, when the washing stuff had to be carried here from Bendigo, a distance of seven or eight miles. Four seizures of sly grog-sellers' carts, &c., were made here by the