At the distance of about a mile to the southward a line of trees marked the course of another channel which, containing only a few ponds, we crossed without difficulty.  Beyond it we traversed a plain five miles in extent, and backed by low grassy hills composed of grey gneiss.  The most accessible interval between these hills still appeared to be in the direction I had chosen at Mount Hope, as leading to the lowest opening of a range still more distant:  I therefore continued on that bearing, having the highest of those hills to our left at the distance of five or six miles.  On entering the wood skirting the wide plain, our curiosity was rather disappointed at finding, instead of rare things, the black-butted gum and casuarinae, trees common in the colony.  The woolly gum also grew there, a tree much resembling the box in the bark on its trunk, although that on the branches, unlike the box, is smooth and shining.  In this wood we recognised the rosella parrot, and various plants so common near Sydney but not before seen by us in the interior.

At ten miles we travelled over undulating ground for the first time since we left the banks of the Lachlan; and we crossed a chain of ponds watering a beautiful and extensive valley covered with a luxuriant crop of the anthisteria grass.  Kangaroos were now to be seen on all sides, and we finally encamped on a deeper chain of ponds, probably the chief channel of the waters of that valley.  A ridge of open forest-hills appearing before us, I rode to the top of one of the highest summits while the men pitched the tents; and from it I perceived a hilly country through whose intricacies I at that time saw no way, and beyond it a lofty mountain range arose in the south-west.  To venture into such a region with wheel-carriages seemed rather hazardous when I recollected the coast ranges of the colony; and I determined to examine it further before I decided whether we should penetrate these fastnesses, or travel westward round them, thus to ascertain their extent in that direction and that of the good land watered by them.

July 5.

I proceeded with several men mounted towards the lofty hill to the eastward of our route, the highest of those I had intersected from Mount Hope and the Pyramid-hill, its aboriginal name, as I afterwards learnt, being Barrabungale.* Nearly the whole of our way was over granite rocks.  We had just reached a naked mass near the principal summit when the clouds, which had been lowering for some time, began to descend on the plains to the northward, and soon closing over the whole horizon compelled me to return, without having had an opportunity of observing more than that the whole mass of mountains in the south declined to the westward.  This was however a fact of considerable importance with respect to our further progress; for I could enter that mountain-region with less hesitation as I knew that I could leave it, if necessary, and proceed westward by following down any of the valleys which declined in that direction.