Page:Victoria, with a description of its principal cities, Melbourne and Geelong.djvu/62

 purposes, that is worse watered. The early settlers suffered severely from the want of this indispensable desideratum. One or two of the lakes also, in the interior, are salt, and several brackish; the latter, however, are used by the inhabitants and for the cattle; custom, and the lack of better, rendering it palatable, and even preferable to fresh—an instance of which occurred to the author, having met a squatter from such a district, who stated that he could not drink fresh water for some time after leaving his station, and for that purpose always took a supply of salt to suit his taste.

There are three rivers remarkable as falling into lakes, having no outlet to the sea, and are, therefore, supposed to have some subterraneous connexion with it, or the neighbouring rivers that have. These are, the Wimmera into Lake Hindmarsh; the Avon into Lake Boloke; and the Avoca into Lake Bael-bael.

Within the limits of the State there are only two good harbours besides those spoken of in Port Phillip Bay. These are. Port Albert and Welsh Pool to the eastward, in the territory known as Gipp's Land; to the westward are Port Fairy, Portland Bay, and Lady Bay, and the harbour of Warrnambool; but these latter are unfortunately exposed to the south-east winds, which render them unsafe during its prevalence. Besides these, there is a harbour at Western Port.

Of the soils of the country it would be impossible,