COOPER'S CREEK.

BAS-RELIEF: DEATH OF BURKE.

BAS-RELIEF: FINDING OF BURKE.

VALLEY OF LAUNCESTON, VAN DIEMEN'S LAND.

COURSE OF THE TAMAR, VAN DIEMEN'S LAND.

GORGE OF THE TAMAR, VAN DIEMEN'S LAND.

HOBART TOWN.

ON THE WAY TO THE WOOD-DRIFT.

OUR ARRIVAL AT THE DRIFT-KEEPER'S COTTAGE.

INTERIOR OF TOMERL'S COTTAGE.

"FIXING THE BOAT-HOOK INTO AN INDENTATION, I PULLED MYSELF IN."

ENTERING THE EYRIE.

FOOTNOTES.

AUSTRALIAN SCENES AND ADVENTURES.

CONCLUDING PAPER.

People who go to Australia expecting every other man they meet to be a convict, and every convict a ruffian in felon's garb, will assuredly find themselves mistaken. And if contemplating a residence in Sydney or Melbourne they need not anticipate the necessity of living in a tent or a shanty, nor yet of accepting the society of convicts or negroes as the only alternative to a life of solitude. Neither will it be necessary to go armed with revolvers by day, nor to place plate and jewels under guard at night. Sydney, the capital of the penal colony, is a quiet, orderly city, abounding in villas and gardens, churches and schools, and about its well-lighted streets ride and walk well-dressed and well-bred people, whose visages betray neither the ruffian nor the cannibal. Some of them may be convicts or "ticket-of-leave-men," but this a stranger would need to be told, as they dress like others, their equipages are quite as stylish, and many of them not only amass more property, but are really more honest, than some of those never sentenced, because they know that the continuance of their freedom depends on their reputation.

.

The city, built on the south side of a beautiful lake, is perfectly unique in design, being composed of five broad promontories, looking like the five fingers of a hand slightly expanded. All the important streets run from east to west, and each terminates in a distinct harbor, while clearly visible from the upper portion of the street is a grand moving panorama of vessels of every description, with masts, sails and colors that seem peering out from every interstice between the houses. Each day witnesses the arrival and departure of eight or ten steamers, ferry-boats leave every half hour all the principal landings for the various sections of the city, and the wharves are lined with the shipping of every nation, many of the vessels ranging from fifteen hundred to two thousand tons burden. On a huge rock in Watson's Bay stands the lighthouse at the entrance of Port Jackson. The sea lashes the black rock with ceaseless fury, the light from the summit rendering even the base visible at a great distance. The light is 350 feet above the level of the sea, yet it was almost under its very rays that the good ship Dunbar came to grief. Missing the passage, she was engulfed in the raging sea, and her three hundred and ninety passengers perished in full view of the homes they were seeking.

Orange and almond trees, with other tropical plants, loaded with blossoms and fruit, beautify the lowlands, while in more elevated localities are found the fruits and foliage of the temperate zone, very many of them exotics brought by the settlers from their English homes. Down to the very water's edge extends the verdure of tree and shrub, overshadowing to the right Fort Jackson, and to the left Middle Harbor. The Government House commands the bay with the imposing mien of a fortress, and the magnificent reception-rooms are worthy of a sovereign's court. The garden surrounding it occupies a beautiful promontory, its borders washed by the sea, the walks shaded by trees imported from Europe, and the whole parterre redolent with tropical beauty and fragrance. On the promenades are frequently assembled at evening two or three hundred ladies and gentlemen in full dress, while military bands discourse sweet music for the entertainment of the brilliant throng.

Ballarat may be called the city of gold; Melbourne, of clubs, democracy and thriving commerce; Hobart Town takes the premium for hospitality and picturesque beauty; but Sydney bears the impress of genuine English aristocracy, in combination with a sort of Creole piquancy singularly in contrast with English exclusiveness, yet giving a wonderful charm to the society of this city of high life, so full of gayety, brilliancy and luxury. Who would recognize in the Sydney of to-day, with its four hundred thousand inhabitants, its churches, theatres and libraries, the outgrowth of the penal colony of Botany Bay, planted only eighty-seven years ago on savage shores? It was in May, 1787, that the first colony left England for Botany Bay, a squadron of eleven vessels, carrying eleven hundred and eighteen colonists to make a lodgment on an unknown shore inhabited by savages. Of these eleven hundred and eighteen, there were six hundred male and two hundred and fifty female convicts, the remaining portion being composed of officers and soldiers to take charge of the new penal settlement, under the command of Governor Phillip. From so unpromising a beginning has grown the present rich and flourishing settlement, and in lieu of the few temporary shanties erected by the first colonists there stands a magnificent city of more than ordinarily fine architecture, with banks and hospitals, schools and churches—among the latter a superb