The country between the Hawkesbury and Rose Hill is that which I have hitherto spoken of.  When the river is crossed, this prospect soon gives place to a very different one.  The green vales and moderate hills disappear at the distance of about three miles from the river side, and from Knight Hill, and Mount Twiss,* the limits which terminate our researches, nothing but precipices, wilds and deserts, are to be seen.  Even these steeps fail to produce streams.  The difficulty of penetrating this country, joined to the dread of a sudden rise of the Hawkesbury, forbidding all return, has hitherto prevented our reaching Carmarthen mountains.

[Look at the Map. (There is no map accompanying this etext)]

Let the reader now cast his eye on the relative situation of Port Jackson.  He will see it cut off from communication with the northward by Broken Bay, and with the southward by Botany Bay; and what is worse, the whole space of intervening country yet explored, (except a narrow strip called the Kangaroo Ground) in both directions, is so bad as to preclude cultivation.

The course of the Hawkesbury will next attract his attention.  To the southward of every part of Botany Bay we have traced this river; but how much farther in that line it extends we know not.  Hence its channel takes a northerly direction, and finishes its course in Broken Bay, running at the back of Port Jackson in such a manner as to form the latter into a peninsula.

The principal question then remaining is, what is the distance between the head of Botany Bay and the part of the Hawkesbury nearest to it?  And is the intermediate country a good one, or does it lead to one which appearances indicate to be good?  To future adventurers who shall meet with more encouragement to persevere and discover than I and my fellow wanderer[s] did, I resign the answer.  In the meantime the reader is desired to look at the remarks on the map (there is no map accompanying this etext), which were made in the beginning of August 1790, from Pyramid Hill, which bounded our progress on the southern expedition; when, and when only, this part of the country has been seen.

It then follows that from Rose Hill to within such a distance of the Hawkesbury as is protected from its inundations, is the only tract of land we yet know of, in which cultivation can be carried on for many years to come.  To aim at forming a computation of the distance of time, of the labour and of the expense, which would attend forming distinct convict settlements, beyond the bounds I have delineated; or of the difficulty which would attend a system of communication between such establishments and Port Jackson, is not intended here.

Until that period shall arrive, the progress of cultivation, when it shall have once passed Prospect Hill, will probably steal along to the southward, in preference to the northward, from the superior nature of the country in that direction, as the remarks inserted in the map will testify.